Match winner: Berrick Barnes
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For the second time in as many weeks Australia needed a late penalty to edge past Wales, winning 20-19 in an engrossing clash in Sydney.
Berrick Barnes landed a penalty five minutes from full-time to break Welsh hearts after yet another spirited display from the visitors.
The result leaves Wales winless against the Wallabies on Australia soil since 1969.
When the dust settles, the Welsh will have some long analysis to do, both on themselves and on Craig Joubert, who had a big influence on the game. He attempted to lay down the law as strictly as possible, but ended up breaking the rhythm and causing frustration a little too much, while also failing to deal with a lot of unwillingness to scrum properly from both sides. Australia responded slightly better overall but both teams looked scared to attempt things at times, too desperate at others.
They'll also reflect on the bounce of the ball which took James Hook's long hack downfield into touch milliseconds before the chasing Hook, 10 metres ahead of his nearest opponent arrived to gather it. Sometimes you just can't buy a break.
But there's little point in the Welsh screaming at Joubert or Lady Luck. They could also look to the number of restarts they failed to deal with and the two clear penalties in the 73rd and 74th minutes, of which first cost them good attacking position and the second the winning three points.
There was nothing to choose between the teams at half time in rugby terms but Barnes' fourth penalty just before the interval gave Australia a 12-9 lead - the four penalty to three scoreline an indication both of the broken rhythm of the game and the incessant stream of penalties. The second half was better as the teams tired and the game broke up naturally.
It took 61 minutes for the first try to be scored, but when Ryan Jones crashed over under the posts on a pick-and-go after Alex Cuthbert's run Wales took the lead for the first time and were good value for it. More precise on attack and threatening with ball in hand, the scrum was beginning to turn the screw as well.
The try drew an immediate response though - again from one of those spilled restarts - and the defence, panicked, folded in and left Rob Horne oodles of space outside. Even then, Horne almost butchered it, ending up controlling the ball between forearm and leg as he touched down. the TMO deemed that enough downward pressure and Australia had the lead back.
Leigh Halfpenny's fourth penalty - his second from 50 metres - with ten minutes left on the clock put the Six Nations champions back in front to set up a grandstand finish.
Barnes held his nerve, however, to split the uprights in the 75th minute to give Australia a one-point win and a 3-0 series clean sweep.
Man of the match: Try-scorer Ryan Jones and Jonathan Davies had strong games for the Welsh. A mention too for Barnes, who was near faultless from the kicking tee and landed the winning points with a cool swing of the leg. But we'll go for Wallaby skipper David Pocock who was a constant thorn in the side of the Welshman at the breakdown.
Moment of the match: The TMO made big call when he awarded Rob Horne's try. At first glance it looked like the centre lost control in act of going over. It would have ben extremely harsh to deny the try and, in the end, it turned out be a game-changing decision...
Villain of the match: No nasty stuff to report...
The scorers:
For Australia:
Try: Horne
Pens: Barnes 5
For Wales:
Try: R. Jones
Con: Halfpenny
Pens: Halfpenny 4
Australia: 15 Kurtley Beale, 14 Adam Ashley-Cooper, 13 Rob Horne, 12 Pat McCabe, 11 Digby Ioane, 10 Berrick Barnes, 9 Will Genia, 8 Wycliff Palu, 7 David Pocock (c), 6 Scott Higginbotham, 5 Nathan Sharpe, 4 Sitaleki Timani, 3 Sekope Kepu, 2 Tatafu Polota Nau, 1 Benn Robinson.
Replacements: 16 Stephen Moore, 17 Ben Alexander, 18 Rob Simmons, 19 Dave Dennis, 20 Michael Hooper, 21 Nic White, 22 Anthony Fainga'a.
Wales: 15 Leigh Halfpenny, 14 Alex Cuthbert, 13 Jonathan Davies, 12 Ashley Beck, 11 George North, 10 Rhys Priestland, 9 Mike Phillips, 8 Ryan Jones, 7 Sam Warburton (c), 6 Dan Lydiate, 5 Alun Wyn Jones, 4 Bradley Davies, 3 Adam Jones, 2 Matthew Rees, 1 Gethin Jenkins.
Replacements: 16 Ken Owens, 17 Paul James, 18 Luke Charteris, 19 Justin Tipuric, 20 Rhys Webb, 21 James Hook, 22 Scott Williams.
Referee: Craig Joubert (South Africa)
Assistant referees: Jaco Peyper (South Africa), Jonathon White (New Zealand)
Television match official: Vinny Munro (New Zealand)






Comments
nastyned says...
When Australia were defending a narrow lead at the end of this test, they had forwards running hard round the corner, getting over the advantage line. Compare to last week, when Wales were static and indecisive. Wales have only themselves to blame. Complaining about the ref only hides your own side's inadequacies, the ref doesn't knock on, kick the ball away and miss tackles.
Posted 14:21 23rd June 2012
bomberB says...
Another great game !
Firstly Wales are a great side.
Secondly, Wallbiies to be best Team in world session end.
Thirdly, great stuff again.
Fourthly if you can't appreciate why rugby is great fun bummer .
Posted 14:03 23rd June 2012
TheLegacy says...
What about those allblacks...
Posted 13:51 23rd June 2012
Trinats2 says...
Australia didn't deserve this win, they were woeful. Beale should have been taken off, poor coaching. Deans needs to go. Pocock was awsome, and keeping Deans in his job.
All credit to Wales, they only concided 3 tries in the 6 nations and on todays efforts, one can see why.
Posted 13:15 23rd June 2012
84GS says...
here we go again, lots of complaining about the ref, excuses excuses bottom line is 3 tests 3 wins , that is now 7 straight against Wales, JayStarr yes we all know the Boks are better Blah Blah it is 5 out of the last 6 to the Wallabies in that score as well
Posted 13:15 23rd June 2012
matt223267 says...
Firstly very well done to Aus, deserving 3 -0 winners of a generally entertaining series
To start with a positive, this series for me shows that ability wise - wales can cut it with the big 3 something that was not the case in past years, all 3 defeats were the result of small margins and errors in our game rather than general gap in quality
However this is offset by the mental weakness we've shown this year, Wales to me still face SH opposition HOPING for the win rather than expecting it
This is also not helped by management, Howley?s talk of being "proud" of coming so close is worrying - if we want to win world cups a 3 - 0 whitewash should not result in "proudness" it is after all complete failure.
Gatland likes to compare Wales to the All Blacks in the past (i.e. he?s talked about thinking what would the All Blacks do in this situation) well last week they won by a few points and made 6 changes then won by 60, Wales lost, then let their players have another go "cause they deserved it" and lost again - If management want to change our mentality they have to show that losing valiently to the big 3 is not good enough and will result in players being dropped, it?s called being ruthless and if a player can't handle it - it shows they don't handle the pressure well
Posted 12:08 23rd June 2012
melkdave says...
This type of game is what you get ,when a referee enforces the laws literally pedatically ,and with no feeling for the flow of the game at all.Not one of his best ,but he was correct in every penalty to the letter of the laws.Also not his fault the players made so many mistakes ,and played so poorly ,which also made it a very tedious game to watch
Posted 11:32 23rd June 2012
Ramage says...
Still showing poor sportsmanship always easy to blame the ref same old story sad loser.
Posted 11:15 23rd June 2012
olepete says...
PR complaining about refs in both tests so far! Can't wait to see what you write after this afternoon's match reffed by none other than Steve Walsh..... Bring back Wayne Barnes?
Posted 11:12 23rd June 2012
brands says...
just finished watching the ABs V Ireland, Aus need to step up 100% to not recieve the same.
Posted 10:53 23rd June 2012
anotherfarce says...
Joubert man of the match again for Australia.
In the 1st half Wales about to score on Australias line when they infringe whilst Wales were still in possession, Where was the advantage Mr Joubert. He killed off just about every attacking move the Welsh made near Australias line.
Very poor refereeing, he was the only one that kept oz in the match which was at best a scrappy game.
Posted 10:52 23rd June 2012
JayStarr says...
@ celticspirit: I'm South African, but as I implied in my original post, I didn't think Craig Joubert had a good game. In fact, that was the worst game I've seen by him for a while (and he has consistently been one of the best lately). But yes, it was very apparent to me that he wasn't at his usual standard today.
@ auntie_social: Whatever Trevor. That game could've just as easily gone Wales' way and you know it. And you just sound like a fool for trying to argue that Wales and Australia are not on the same level at the moment - two games in a row where it could've gone either way until the last minute... even though it was played in Australia: not very convincing. You cannot possibly have eyes in your head and argue that Australia (or Wales) is better than South Africa at the moment. That's just silly talk...
If you don't want to believe me, just see what everyone else is saying about the game.
Posted 10:44 23rd June 2012
jonesy2 says...
terrible game. australia ordinary but good enough clearly they will raise their game for the tri nations especially when JOC gets back. joubers had a pretty bad game and i think wales benefited but it was hard to say
JayStarr if you think australia and wales are on the same level you better hope the boks back that statement up considering they have only fairly comfortably beaten a terrible england side i dont know if that means the boks are below wales?
Posted 10:41 23rd June 2012
cuw3100 says...
Dont Worry JAY the MIBs are back on song :) (hope u get the drift mate - Jay is a character in MIB series LOL)
past 50 and looking for more.
Posted 10:33 23rd June 2012
makemehappy says...
Well done Australia - 1 v0 series winners. Honours to the ref though for winning 2!
Wales coped pretty well with Australia and both lacked flair. Wales better in the scrum, Aussies in the loose. Sadly the ref refused to penalise the Aussies for going off their feet, being offside and taking someone out in the air. More than happy to penalise Wales for not being off side and for not rolling away when they did. Pathetic refereeing!
Posted 10:28 23rd June 2012
Letsgoboks says...
You have to question the coaching staff for Wales when a team gives away so many penalties....
Yuk
Posted 10:21 23rd June 2012
Fatflanker says...
Well done 3N and 6N champions for three close and hard-fought games. Now for the battle of the also-rans...
Posted 09:39 23rd June 2012
froggy73 says...
Boring rugby on both sides :(
Posted 08:42 23rd June 2012
auntie_social says...
My goodness you're tedious JayStarr.
Yes it was a poor game of rugby, but lets knock this 'Australia were lucky' nonsense on the head. Regardless of the moments leading up to it, the ball was grounded correctly, and as such was a fair try. We all know you don't like that, but you're going to have to deal with it. The Wallabies also had more territory, possession and closed out the game when the needed to, yet again.
Joubert frustrating. Not really. My only gripes were that he refused to penalise Wales for cynically taking Pocock out off the ball the entire game. He could also have pulled up the blatantly forward pass that led to Wales' 5m scrum on the Australian line, ultimately resulting in the try. Or could have even have penalised the Welsh scrum when it completely disintegrated.
See how easy it is to cherry-pick refereeing decisions that go against you and make them responsible for a loss.
Interesting that you think that the teams are evenly matched. That means Wales are better than South Africa, as Australia certainly are according to their last 7 games.
Posted 08:40 23rd June 2012
TVaddict says...
Both teams were bad, it was a dull game, Australia were ultimately more clinical. I was surprised at how cynical both teams were with so much of the ball stuff happening. Lets hope the Ireland and New Zealand game is better.
Posted 08:34 23rd June 2012