‘Work to be done’: Les Kiss reflects on Wallabies’ defeat to England

Australia coach Les Kiss has identified some bad habits in the Wallabies’ game after a 45-22 loss to England in the Nations Championship, acknowledging “there’s work to be done” before playing Scotland at Scottish Gas Murrayfield.

The Wallabies wrapped up the first Nations Championship phase in July with a 57-10 win against Italy, which was Joe Schmidt’s final game in charge. Kiss then took over as head coach, helping the Aussies extend their unbeaten run to six Tests.

But a two-nil Bledisloe Cup series sweep by the All Blacks brought that streak to an emphatic end, before suffering another defeat in their opening Spring Tour Test. Henry Pollock scored two tries on the wing as England gave their vocal home crowd plenty to sing and cheer about.

Fin Smith finished with 10 points off the kicking tee, Maro Itoje made a game-high 16 tackles, and Ben Earl topped the charts with 22 carries. It was a nine-point ball game at the break but England ran in four tries during a 26-point blitz in the second half.

“We’re training really well but the 80 minutes is more important. We’ve got to make sure we’ve got that transference,” Kiss said post-game on Stan Sport.

“I know the boys are continuing to work hard. We’ll have to challenge ourselves and each other about what needs to be done because there’s work to be done.”

The first half was a fairly closely-fought contest, with the Wallabies able to stay in the fight despite a yellow card to Angus Bell. Ryan Lonergan knocked over a penalty goal in the 12^th minute before the home side hit back with an Ollie Chessum try.

It was 12-3 when Bell was told to sit down for 10 minutes, with the English extending their lead through tighthead prop Joe Heyes. But Max Jorgensen gave Wallabies fans plenty to cheer about in the early hours on Monday morning in Australia, racing away for a try just before the half.

‘Jorgo’ picked off a pass and won a race to the try line, before Lonergan added the extras with a routine shot at the poles. The Wallabies remained in the fight, but England landed a couple of point-scoring shots during the third ‘quarter’ of the Test.

“I thought the first half, we probably went into some bad habits and played a bit narrow but we needed to get the ball into the first hands, shift the point of attack, create our swing that we have, which we got to in the second half,” Kiss reflected.

“We just didn’t get enough of those opportunities in the first half. The second half, yep, we certainly started to put something together.

“We’ve got to do better in the early parts to be able to give ourselves a chance.”

The Wallabies will face Scotland in the fifth Nations Championship round next weekend, as the final ladder positions in both the southern and northern conferences takes shape ahead of the first-of-its-kind Finals Weekend.

Australia have a better record against the Scots, but winning away at Murrayfield has proved difficult in the last decade. The Wallabies have done it once, securing a one-point win in 2022, but the Scots have otherwise been victories in three of the last four meetings there.

“It’s areas that we’re trying to improve. Some habits there that we’re trying to break down and get right and it’s been costly for sure,” he added.

“We’ve just got to keep working on those things and make sure that we’re in front of the areas that we know we have to turn. We do it in training, we’re just not transferring that into the game.”