It has taken a while but England are finally celebrating their first major series win in the southern hemisphere.
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“Australia will try and throw everything at us on Saturday and we’ll be ready for the challenge”.
The Reds captain said the Wallabies wouldn’t be shrinking into a corner or avoiding the reality of the opening two Tests. A proper Test match. Same as last week – we played a lot of footy, but playing a lot of footy doesn’t win you the game.
After they were well beaten last week, it would be assumed that the Australian media would start to respect the English team; however this was not the case. “We came here to win the series 3-0 and that’s what we want to do on Saturday”. Only New Zealand are a more powerful force on the global stage and while toppling the All Blacks in a three-Test series would be beyond the Grand Slam champions at this point, there is now genuine hope that they could seize their crown at the next World Cup. They’d be thinking 3-0.
“In both games so far they’ve played very smart, they’ve played in the right areas and played well at the ruck, they’ve spoiled a lot of good ball for us”, Cheika said.
“We are respectful that Australia are a wounded animal and they’re going to come hard at us, but we’ve had a good preparation and we’re in a good spot to play well. Most people are looking at the big things and I think it’s actually the detail of the game, everyone doing their role really well that makes a difference at this level”, Moore told reporters. “If we play well then everything looks after itself”. “We have to be tactically flexible in Test rugby and that’s why I’m so pleased for the team”, Jones said. But I’ve got to make sure that that message is clear.
England’s victory was founded on a courageous defensive display that was inspired by “The Guy In The Glass” by Dale Wimbrow, a poem about being true to yourself that was read to the squad earlier in the week by assistant coach Paul Gustard. Generally we handled the Australian attack pretty well.
‘The fantastic thing is that to win a series like this is a win for English rugby in total – it’s a win for fans, the Rugby Football Union and the media, ‘ Jones said. David Pocock, the star of their World Cup, is set to miss the rest of the series with a fractured eye socket.
The Aussies were still laughing when he arrived here eight months on to be greeted by a TV trailer mocking him (see below) as the face of England’s darkest hour.
“We know what we want to do and we want to go out there and put that jersey on and do it proud. They’re a well-coached, driven team so we’re anticipating quite a feisty encounter at Sydney”.
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England won the match in Melbourne by “rope-a-dope”, said Jones, having soaked up a period of sustained pressure from Australia’s risky backs for much of the second half before Owen Farrell scored the winning try with five minutes left.
