Ex-Wallaby reveals northern hemisphere tactic Aussies can't handle, Rennie says loss 'hurts everyone'

Dave Rennie’s post-match press conference following the historic loss to Italy was short. Short as in time, and short on detail as to how the Wallabies suffered a first-ever loss to Italy in 19 internationals across 39 years.

In the aftermath of Italy’s one-point win – in truth they should have been out of sight before Ben Donaldson’s conversion miss that might have produced an unjust Wallabies escape – the spotlight has already been turned on Rennie’s decision to make 11 changes from the team beaten by France last week.

There is no doubt Rennie has had more than his share of bad fortune and it struck again on match eve when a 12th change was forced by the withdrawal of Nick Frost – one of Australia’s best so far on tour.

Injuries to Tom Banks and Lalakai Foketi have been problems outside of Rennie’s making. But there is a creeping sense that the Wallabies’ discipline issues – they conceded 16 penalties to nine on Sunday – is something he can’t fix.

The 12 changes have already been seen in some quarters as arrogance and a sign the Wallabies underestimated their opponent.

“It’s not much more changes than we made the week before,” argued Rennie.

“There’s a couple of extra bodies that we would have played today had they not been injured from the French game. We picked squads along those lines, while they might have been tweaked a little bit, we looked at how we were going to give ourselves the best chance to win all five games on tour and we had a good enough side out on the paddock tonight to win.”

 (Photo by Timothy Rogers/Getty Images)

“They didn’t underestimate them,” said Justin Harrison on Stan Sport.

“What they’ve done is not met the passion that the Italians bring to the arena with skill execution and discipline. Discipline isn’t just not giving away penalties and being offside.

“Discipline to stay in your defensive formation, discipline to attack the line, discipline to keep players in motion, discipline to work off the ball, discipline to talk in defence. To work together and prepare for these situations.

“No one walks into a Test arena without absolute intent to meet the opponent with everything you’ve got. The difficulty tonight was 12 of those players haven’t played much Test rugby together. They weren’t good at finding a solution together under extreme pressure.”

Drew Mitchell called the mass changes “poor coaching”, while Morgan Tuirinui spotted something else – Australia’s inability to defend against a new style of attack from northern hemisphere teams.

“I think the results probably says that we need to question that,” Turinui said of the imapct of the changes.

“But I look at the team list and I think that’s a team that should have won the game.

“You can talk about the amount of time they spent together, play together, the combinations – there’s smarter people than I that work on the cohesive nature of all these lineups.

“I look at the talent in that team and I think some of the specific actions of individuals on the team cost them the game.

“But I also think the other side of it was Italy … we’ve seen a theme with the Wallaby defence a little bit this year that they’ve struggled with the very new nature of attack right around the world.

“There’s a real change in pitch and the Wallabies struggled last week against France and they struggled against Scotland.

“Two tries from Italy tonight and a couple of linebreaks were real changes of pictures. The Wallabies are not coping with that attacking shape. They’ve got a lot of work to do defensively.”

Here’s what Dave Rennie said

Rennie acknowledged Italy were well deserved winners.

“We didn’t play well enough to win. Turned over pill too much. Too many penalties. We gave him a little bit of a head start – 17-3 they get a lot of hope and enthusiasm and it brought the crowd into the game,” Rennie said.

“We were will aware of the strengths of the Italian side and we needed to start well and we didn’t.

“It’s hugely disappointing and not good enough. All I can say is that it’s hurting. You go into the change rooms and the boys are hurt. They know we’re better than that so I understand the frustration.

“It hurts everyone involved. We had a good enough side on the field. But we just gave up too many soft points and too much position and ended up position and territory eventually hit us.”

On the yellow card to Jake Gordon

The Waratahs No.9 had a forgettable game having been rotated into the starting lineup with Nic White rested altogether.

On 15 minutes Gordon cynically took out Tommaso Allan and paid with a stint in the sin bin.

“I’m not sure about the yellow card,” Rennie said.

Jake Gordon. (Photo by Timothy Rogers/Getty Images)

“I thought overall [referee Brendon Pickerill] did a pretty good job with the whistle. We’d been penalised a few times prior to that so maybe that had an influence.”

On Ben Donaldson’s state of mind

Donaldson had been on for less than five minutes in his debut when he had to step up with a chance to win the game. It was a big call from Rennie to remove Noah Lolesio with just five minutes to play, giving Donaldson no time at all to get into the game.

“It’s tough, you know. He’s hurting. We’ve definitely got an arm around him,” Rennie said. “You can always look at the last few seconds of the game but there’s a lot of things that we got wrong earlier on that put a dent in that situation and you’re trying to steal a game. We feel for him but it’s not the reason we lost today.”

On Lolesio’s performance

The Brumbies playmaker was given a big chance to impress but didn’t seize it. Not his fault, surmised Rennie, as he was asked about Lolesio’s kicking effectiveness.

“We didn’t kick enough in the first half – we barely kicked the ball at all – so we didn’t really have a chance to stress them and put them under heat,” said Rennie.

“Second half, probably at times we over kicked but they’re not Noah’s issues.

“I thought he was pretty composed, trained well all week in preparation. But we didn’t dominate up front as we would have hoped, didn’t get quick enough ball to  allow him to play flat and on top of the defensive line.”

On the Australian lineout

Folau Fainga’a and Lachie Lonergan both had issues with their throwing – an area in which rested Dave Porecki has excelled.

“I think our lineout’s excellent,” said Rennie. “We got a couple of things wrong but generally on an individual and not always the thrower.

“We’ll assess the whole game as to where we need to be better but overall our lineout and maul defence was very good but the collision area, the turnovers, the discipline hurt us.”

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