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Yesterday The Roar published a clip with Wallaby coach Michel Cheika saying “A lot of people like to see us down”.
Importantly coach, they are not Australians.
Tonight at Allianz Stadium, it’s a sell-out. The vast majority of the crowd will be Aussies keen to see the Wallabies return to their ball-in-hand, running rugby to avoid a whitewash by England.
Let’s face it, the first two Tests were won by England 39-28 and 23-7 playing inferior rugby, but were gifted victories by rubbish Wallaby play.
Coach, that’s the reason why the Wallaby fans are understandably disappointed.
When a Wallaby pulls on a gold jersey, it’s reasonable to expect every one of the 23-man squad has a firm grip on rugby’s basic essentials of accurate passing, safe handling, support play, retention, and tackling.
Anything less, and the question has to be asked – how in hell were they selected?
Last Saturday, with 70 per cent possession and territory, the Wallabies were easily beaten with so many moments of missing basics.
England couldn’t believe their luck, victory was gift-wrapped in Wallaby self destruction.
Said Wallaby captain Stephen Moore: “We have to play better”.
Go on.
New vice-captain Rob Horne: “We have to learn from our mistakes”.
Go on.
Two of the most senior Wallabies stating the bleeding obvious.
The better answers would have been why didn’t the Wallabies play better, and why did the Wallabies make so many mistakes?
We still don’t know.
Melbourne was the latest debacle with Moore, Sekope Kepu, James Slipper, Rory Arnold, Sam Carter, Scott Fardy, Dean Mumm, and Nick Phipps the main offenders.
Bernard Foley has been included by some in that list, but in all fairness he was given atrocious service by Phipps with high, low, and behind him passes that were late in delivery to allow the England defence to easily smother the Wallaby 10.
But out of those failures in Melbourne only Arnold and Carter have been dumped altogether, the rest have survived.
On the other side of the selection coin, inside centre Samu Kerevi has also been sacked and for no valid reason, plus bench winger Luke Morahan.
So is Cheika making a combination of pick-and-stick selections with form selections?
If that’s the case why was Kerevi shown the door?
He had to fit in with either selection policy, but his replacement Matt Toomua doesn’t qualify for either.
The Melbourne pack boasted 345 caps. Tonight there will be 413 caps with the addition of locks Will Skelton and Rob Simmons.
The Melbourne backline had 171 caps, tonight it’s 207 with Toomua’s inclusion.
On that basis Wallaby fans expect the basics to be better, or Michael Cheika will have no option but to the wield the axe for the Rugby Championship.
In the meantime, the prospect of Skelton and debutant bench man Adam Coleman locking in together as soon as possible will be mouth-watering.
Two behemoth units: Skelton 203 cms and 140 kgs and Coleman 204 cms and 122 kgs.
And a Wallaby win.