“It’s devastating to play the way we did and not come away with the win”. He will have scans this week to determine if he can play against the Pumas.
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Laidlaw’s conversion, plus a subsequent penalty had the Scottish fans in dreamland with a 13-5 lead.
With rain pouring down, the Wallabies gave one last push and it was a controversial penalty call from referee Craig Joubert in the dying moments gave Australia a final shot at victory.
Wallaby fly-half Foley expertly scored the winning points.
“I am just proud of the way the boys knuckled in there at the end. No doubt”, Moore said.
“You take the win anyway you can”. “It is what it is and you have to deal with it”.
The battle between the winners of the Rugby Championship and the side who finished last in the Six Nations after losing every game looked a mismatch on paper but there was nothing between them in what developed into an epic see-saw battle.
Wallabies coach Michael Cheika, who also mentored Foley at the Waratahs, put complete faith in the young playmaker.
However, the Aussies had one final say before the interval, Michael Hooper pushing through the pack to record the pushover try, with another failed conversion from Foley leaving the match narrowly titling in the Scots’ favour at 16-15 as the half-time whistle blew.
Asked if his team had produced a great escape, Cheika said any late win could be dubbed as one.
“Although we’ve got massive improvements [to make] in certain areas, our try-scoring ability was there”.
“Maybe we shouldn’t have opened it up for them but we wanted to play to our identity which is to play running footy”. We have to bring the rest of our game as well.
Horne took up the role of scrum-half and the Australian defence fell asleep at the ruck and his picked up and strolled over the whitewash.
We couldn’t kick a ball without a few rampaging Scotsman charging it down. “We were all going for it”, Phipps said.
“It’s important that we build on this”, he said.
However, he added, “we’ve got the makings of a strong team”.
“When we do bad things, try to own that, take responsibility and then try to improve as quickly as possible, whether it be in a week or during a match”.
Amid a cacophony of boos, flyhalf Foley kept his composure to split the posts and ensure the World Cup would have four southern hemisphere semifinalists for the first time. I don’t think there is another word to describe the feeling right now.
“You’ve got to have a criteria as to what you do decide”.
Foley was having problems from the tee as he again missed with the conversion attempt, something Laidlaw was not troubled with as he slotted another penalty to increase the deficit to six points.
Five minutes later they repeated the trick on the other wing, Ashley-Cooper crossing, only for the TMO to chalk it off for a knock on.
“He seems to have excelled wwith Scotland and he is the type of player that they didn’t really have before, his breakdown and defensive work is excellent”.
With attention now turning to Argentina, Herald columnist Paul Cully said it was clear Australia badly missed injured star No. 8 Pocock and predicted the Wallabies could not win the World Cup without him.
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“It’s very special and, as a team, we pushed through to the semi-finals”.
