Wallabies great’s bold tip before ‘interesting’ Ireland clash

Wallabies great James Slipper has forecast a shock Quilter Nations Series upset ahead of this weekend’s Tests, believing Australia can return to winning ways against Ireland if they “muster up a good week of prep” in Dublin.

‘Slips’ last played for the Wallabies in their final Rugby Championship match of the year, falling to the All Blacks at Perth’s Optus Stadium. Australia finished The Rugby Championship with a 33 per cent winning record, which included a famous triumph over the Springboks in Johannesburg.

The Wallabies started their new era without the 151-Test veteran with a thrilling four-point win over Japan in Tokyo, before suffering an 18-point defeat to England at Twickenham’s Allianz Stadium and a 26-19 loss to Italy in Udine.

Before the Rugby World Cup Draw early next month, the Wallabies will play another two Tests in a bid to rise up the rankings and into the top band of six teams. They’ll face Ireland and France in their final two matches of 2025, who are ranked third and fifth respectively.

Australia were beaten by Ireland 22-19 in a thriller during their 2024 Spring Tour, before many of the Irish players toured with the British & Irish Lions earlier this year. While the Wallabies will go into the Test as the underdog, Slipper isn’t ruling his former teammates out.

“It’s always the interesting thing around this time, the Irish are just getting back together after a bit of a refresh year from the Lions,” Slipper said on Stan Sport’s Between Two Posts.

“The Wallabies are on the opposite end of that, they’re going into their 14^th Test so there’s going to be two different tales there, one’s pretty fresh, one’s hanging on a bit.

“If we can muster up a good prep week… it’s going to be close either way but I reckon we’ll win.”

The Wallabies are almost through a jam-packed international season, which began with a last-gasp win over the Flying Fijians in Newcastle. That was the team’s only match before the three-Test series against the touring Lions.

After a relatively one-sided first Test, the other two matches of the Lions Series were classics, with the men in gold winning the third clash at Accor Stadium in Sydney. They backed that up with an incredible comeback win over the Springboks at Emirates Airline Park.

While there’s been a fair amount of chatter about whether the wear and tear of a 15-Test season has been a factor for the Wallabies, Slipper was able to respond with the perspective of a 2025 Wallaby..

“I think it’s manageable. There’s always talk around, ‘why do we rest players? Why do we do that?’ If you play every Super game, every Test, you’re looking at over 30 games, plus you’re going around the world a couple of times,” Slipper added.

“I think it’s manageable but I don’t think it’s great for the Wallabies per se. You would not find one Australian rugby player who will say no to playing 15 Tests either.

“One thing you won’t hear from the group and Joe [Schmidt] in particular is they won’t use it as an excuse. I’m pretty sure he said that after the game, like they know what’s coming.”