‘Horrible’: Wallabies suffer agonising defeat to England at Twickenham

Freddie Steward scored his first Test try as England enjoyed their eighth successive win against Australia under coach Eddie Jones.

Steward’s seventh-minute score looked like being the highlight of a scrappy encounter littered with penalties, mostly from the men in yellow.

“It was a frustrating game to watch,” Wallabies great Drew Mitchell told Stan Sport.

“Inaccurate passes, discipline cost them dearly.”

With the last play of the match, England fans in a capacity crowd had another try to cheer when replacement hooker Jamie Blamire crowned a 60-metre move.

England’s remaining points came via six goal kicks from captain Owen Farrell and two from fly-half Marcus Smith.

James O’Connor kicked all of Australia’s points courtesy of five penalties.

Australia’s Tom Wright and Angus Bell were both sent to the sin bin, but England only managed six points in the 20 minutes where they had a man advantage.

Wright was shown a yellow card when he caught Jamie George high as the English hooker went close to scoring a try.

Bell had a 10-minute rest after lifting Courtney Lawes past the horizontal in the second half.

This result, however, maintained veteran coach Jones’ 100 per cent record against his native Australia since he was appointed after a 2015 World Cup where the Wallabies’ 33-13 pool victory over England at Twickenham knocked the hosts out of the tournament.

It also set England up for next week’s rematch with South Africa, the team that beat them in the 2019 World Cup final, after the Springboks defeated Scotland 30-15 at Murrayfield earlier on Saturday.

But for Australia, who arrived in Europe on a five-match winning streak, this was a second successive reverse after a 15-13 loss to the Scots last weekend.

The Wallabies will now look to return to winning ways against Wales in Cardiff a week on Saturday.

Wallabies coach Dave Rennie will be sweating on the fitness of Michael Hooper after the inspirational captain limped off the field with a foot injury in the second half.

Earlier on Sunday, Ireland defeated New Zealand with a stunning 29-20 victory at Lansdowne Road.

– with AFP

Originally published as ‘Horrible’: Wallabies suffer agonising defeat to England at Twickenham