Michael Cheika warns Australia of Scotland RWC threat

The task is pretty challenging when it comes to older players and men.

“It’s important that you keep reinforcing that throughout the week”, Moore said.

England winger Mike Slemen makes a grab for counterpart Robertson during Scotlands 7-7 draw at Twickenham in 1979.

“All I had to do was catch it and run”. He believes that in his 100 caps this is the best squad in terms of camaraderie we have ever had.

Opponent Scotland struggled at the set piece on occasions during the pool stage and Kepu considers it an area where the Wallabies can get on top at Twickenham. It is a tough thing to do.

The harshness of the sentences handed down to the Scotland pair has angered the Dark Blues camp, especially after a raft of similar challenges earlier in the tournament either saw smaller bans issued or the culprits go completely unpunished. Scotland lost narrowly 21-17 in 1979. “But we adapted and got through in the end”. We didn’t really have that game to get used to conditions, our training sessions were controlled because we were getting to the latter parts of the tournament, so we hadn’t been killing ourselves. “Nobody was saying that about us (being favourites) many months ago and things aren’t any different now”, he said.

The Wallabies had a more comfortable semi-final win against the New Zealand All Blacks, and Australia entered the final with better form. There’s not many like him.

The Wallabies have won two out of three when the RWC is held in the northen hemisphere and it is neutral ground while New Zealand have never won any world cups there. “We’ve been very impressed by what we’ve seen”. Tim Swinson, 5. Richie Gray, 6. It was a great experience. “They are quick to the breakdown and very aggressive at the breakdown”. Hindered by injury, Folau hasn’t even scored a try yet. The auto dealership and grandchildren take up most of his time.

“I’m really proud of George and what he’s done”, he said.

Go further back and the results swing Australia’s way. You get such good coverage on the television at home and you can follow everything that’s going on.

“There’s going to be a lot of peripheral talk about the game”. His replacement at No 8, Ben McCalman, will not be shy in coming forward.

“No sport should be so risky that it is going to be not just career threatening but affect people for the rest of their lives”.

Besides an in-form Australia, there’s nothing that makes Kiwi fans more nervous than playing France at a World Cup – regardless of how poor “Les Bleus” might be tracking. “But we think if we play to our strengths, we definitely have a chance”.

When Cowan played the first World Cup warm-up match against Ireland in Dublin, Hardie was absent.

“I do not accept that you pull someone in from overseas and he gets put straight in”. It’s just a shame England aren’t there, but I don’t want to start on that again…

The Scots have made sluggish starts in all of their games in the competition so far but strong second-half displays have seen them claim wins over Japan, U.S. and Samoa. The Sean Lineens of the world are not a problem, that’s fine. “The forwards knew they had them under pressure so we took the scrum and I managed to score off the back of it”.

Australia breezed through the pool stage winning all three matches. But think about the numbers – with four pools of five teams, there will always be one team resting while the others play.

Asked about the bans, “That’s politics, we don’t worry about that”. The teams have played 28 times, and the Wallabies have won 19. So anything can happen.

Cotter said Scotland would be prepared for a full 80-minute effort against the fast-finishing Wallabies, whose win over Wales was clinched in the final 20 minutes with a few crucial bench injections.