England romped to a 30-6 win against Australia at a rain-soaked Twickenham, but the score line doesn’t tell the whole story. Tries from Elliot Daly, Jonathan Joseph, Jonny May and Danny Care saw England home, but there were some 50/50 decisions that could have affected the game either way.
A penalty from Owen Farrell and a blatant missed penalty from Bernard Foley saw England take an early 3-0 lead, and were the dominant team early on. Australia felt aggrieved at having a try disallowed which would have taken them into the lead, however. Michael Hooper thought he’d touched down after a deft little kick through, but the Australia captain was off-side when the kick was made.
Late in the first half Australia had two players sin binned. First Hooper was yellow carded for being repeatedly offside while defending close to his line as England piled the pressure in search of the first try. And then in the dying seconds, Kurtley Beale was sinbinned for a deliberate knock-on.
England conbverted a penalty from the first penalty to stretch the lead to 6-0, but Australia down to 13 men, England failed to take the initiative as they kicked to the corner. England’s lineout was stolen by Rob Simmons, and the Aussies kicked the ball out to end the first half.
Australia reduced the deficit to 6-3 on 49 minutes, while still down to 14 men, when Reece Hodge kicked a monster penalty.
Five minutes later and England notched the game's opening try through Elliot Daly. Samu Kerevi rip-roared his way through England making 35 metres before passing to Tevita Kuridrani who knocked on.
Ben Youngs then hacked the ball clear before Daly set off in chase, and with Beale expecting the ball to drift out of play, Daly scampered after the ball and kicked it just millimetres before it had gone out of play. Daly then chased on kicked again and slid over the.
It was a tight decision, but after an extensive review the TMO decided the ball had just avoided the touchline when bouncing, and the try stood. Farrell converted the penalty and England were 13-3 up.
With 10 minutes left, Australia had a second try disallowed. Koroibete thought he’d touched down but the TMO adjudged hooker Stephen Moore to have obstructed the tackling Chris Robshaw. Again it was a tight decision but it was ruled out and the score remained 13-6.
Then in the last ten minutes England ran in three tries through Joseph, May and Care to seal a comfortable looking win. It was far from it, and some tight decisions could have changed the game, but the decisions were right.
Afterwards, Eddie Jones was happy with the improved performance. "It was a tough old game, there wasn't much in it,” said Jones. “We got the bounce of the ball a few times, but we stuck at it. That was a great team effort. We always back ourselves to play out 80 minutes. At half-time we thought we were in a good position. They had a good 20 minutes after half-time, but we came back really well.”
Australia coach Micahel Cheika, who was visibly and annoyed during the game and might be reprimanded by World Rugby after being seen to say ‘f@cking cheats’ about a decision that went against Australia, was philosophical at the end.
“I think we showed a lot of courage, we stayed in the game in a fair bit of adversity and when the moments came for us to put pressure on England we made some mistakes and they were able to capitalise,” Cheika said. “We are doing everything we can to become a team and a nation that plays rugby with no excuses.”
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