Michael Hooper has been appointed Wallabies captain, with long-serving Stephen Moore stepping down from the role ahead of his international retirement at the end of the season.

Already a veteran of 68 Tests at age 25, flanker Hooper’s first assignment after getting the role fulltime will be to lead the Wallabies in this month’s Bledisloe Cup clashes with the world champion All Blacks.

Hooper has previous experience as skipper, having first stepped in when Moore was injured in 2014 and he also led the team in this year’s opening two Tests in June when Moore was benched.

“It’s a huge honour to just wear the Wallabies jersey, let alone captain the side. I’m extremely grateful to Cheik (coach Michael Cheika) but also to Steve (Moore) for all that he’s done for me and the team,” said Hooper.

“It’s what you do in the jersey that’s most important and I get another crack at showing what it means to me against New Zealand in Sydney in a fortnight.

“There are quite a few good young leaders in this team like Bernard (Foley), Adam (Coleman), Samu (Kerevi) and Allan (Alaalatoa), so we’ll be working together to take this team to a new level.

“I’m really excited about what we can achieve in the next four months.”

Since making his Test debut against Scotland in 2012, Hooper recorded 50 caps in the shortest time of any player (3 years 4 months) and became the second youngest player to hit the milestone when he ran out against Argentina in the 2015 Rugby World Cup semi-final.