LONDON: Bernard Foley orchestrated England’s demise at the Rugby World Cup with his finest performance in a Wallabies jersey, scoring all but five of Australia’s points in a 33-13 win Saturday that ensured the host team will exit the tournament after the pool stage.
After losing narrowly last weekend to Wales, England needed to beat two-time champion Australia to maintain a chance of progressing from Pool A, the most difficult group in the draw.
“Absolutely gutted to be going out of the World Cup. Words can’t express how disappointed we are,” England coach Stuart Lancaster said. “We feel we let down our fantastic supporters. It was a tough pool and in hindsight we put ourselves in a bad position losing last week.”
The Australians exploited the pressure England was under in the must-win match, starting at a fast, physical pace.
“We knew there’d be a lot of pain — we’re in England’s backyard. The atmosphere was outrageously loud, that’s not an easy thing to deal with,” Wallabies coach Michael Cheika said. “We just wanted to get into it — you have not only got to keep your opponents out of the game, you have to keep the crowd out of the game.”
It started badly for England, with flyhalf Foley crossing for sniping tries in the 20th and 35th minutes, converting them both and adding a penalty to give the Wallabies a 17-3 lead at halftime.
Foley extended the lead to 17 points with a penalty goal soon after the break, before winger Anthony Watson triggered an English resurgence by beating two defenders to score a strong try in the right corner in the 56th. Owen Farrell converted and added a penalty goal to cut the gap to 20-13 but his yellow card in the 71st for a shoulder charge on Matt Giteau left England a man short at the end.
Foley landed two more penalties and converted Giteau’s last-minute try from the sideline to finish with a personal haul of 28 points, and later said it was the best game he’d played.
Wallabies captain Stephen Moore praised the performances of Foley, for directing the backline, back-rowers David Pocock and Michael Hooper for winning turnover ball, and the unheralded Australian scrum that had come under heavy scrutiny in the buildup.
England had won its previous three World Cup matches against Australia, including an extra-time win in the 2003 final in Sydney when Jonny Wilkinson landed a dropped goal to break the deadlock.
And the English were slight favorites, with an 81,000-plus crowd at Twickenham, an expected dominance in the set piece, and immense public support in the days leading up to the match.
But little more than two weeks after starting the tournament with a bonus-point win over Fiji, Lancaster’s team was out of contention regardless of what happens in its last pool game against Uruguay. Australia and Wales will meet next weekend to decide top spot in the pool, with the winner likely to avoid South Africa in the quarterfinals.
The loss continued a horrible stretch of pool-stage exits at World Cups for England which started with the football team going out early in Brazil last year, and continued with the cricket team’s poor performance in Australia and New Zealand in March, and now the rugby.
“Myself and the players feel like we have let the country down today,” captain Chris Robshaw said.
A report in The Independent newspaper on Saturday estimated an England defeat would deal a 3 billion pound hit to the economy. But while the absence of the home team will certainly deprive the tournament of some atmosphere, organizers were confident after selling the bulk of tickets and broadcasting rights well in advance.
Home teams have made the semifinals or better in all but one of the previous World Cups, with South Africa (1995) and New Zealand (2011) winning the title on home soil.
The England players gave Australia a guard of honour as they left the field at the end of the game, not unlike the tunnel that thousands of fans formed for the home team as the bus arrived at Twickenham. When the knockout stage starts, they’ll join the ranks of the spectators.--AP