Of course not a real Rommel quote, rather something invented on the internet and spread around there.
Probably compensation issues over Gallipoli...
Compensation for what? You go sit and the bottom of a cliff with your enemy at the top and see how that works out for you... Everyone involved in Gallipoli from the Lancashires to the Anzacs to the Turks (except probably the Royal and French Navies) recognise it as an honourable defeat/victory that happens to have very strong additional national emotion for Australia, New Zealand and modern Turkey. Not something you should make fun of lightly.
I’m a few minutes away from digging out a copy of The Rommel Papers so direct quotes will follow. As I recall it there was something in there from before Tobruk about how he had witnessed Australian infantry in attack and was very impressed.
Here are the relevant quotes from the book:
I have just searched through a .pdf of The Rommel Papers and interesting at almost every time Rommel mentions the Australian units in the too and fro of the desert campaign he gives them a positive adjective. Like “superb”, “fierce” or “leading”. But as to direct quotes there are only really two. The first is by his son talking about his father’s photo collection and the other Rommel’s direct observations.
“He was particularly proud of his colour photographs, some of which had been taken with a certain amount of danger to himself. One, I remember, which was most impressive, showed Australian infantry attacking with bayonets.” Manfred Rommel
“Shortly afterwards a batch of some fifty or sixty Australian prisoners was marched off close beside us immensely big and powerful men, who without question represented an elite formation of the British Empire, a fact that was also evident in battle. ” GFM Erwin Rommel
There doesn’t seem to be any direct explanation of defeat at Tobruk being attributed to the Australian defence but he does mention in relation to the defence of El Alamein explains the British advantages in positional vs mobile warfare, thusly:
“Although the tactical consequences of motorisation and armour had been pre-eminently demonstrated by British military critics, the responsible British leaders had not taken the risk either of using this hitherto untried system as a foundation for peace time training, or of applying it in war. But this failure, which had told so heavily against the British in the past, would not affect the issue of the approaching battle of position and break-through, because the extensive minefields would rob the armour of its freedom of movement and operation, and would force it into the role of the infantry tank. In this form of action the full value of the excellent Australian and New Zealand infantry would be realised and the British artillery would have its effect.” GFM Erwin Rommel