Wales v Australia Preview

With the World Cup just under a year away, Saturday’s game will be a dress rehearsal for the Rugby World Cup when the Aussie’s make their way to Cardiff to take on Wales. When the World Cup draw was made there was no doubt that Group A was so the called group of death with England, Wales and Australia being drawn together in the same group.

This makes Saturday’s game even more important which will give both Gatland and recently appointed Cheika the chance to see how their sides fare against each other before they do battle next year.

This will be Michael Cheika’s first official test match in charge of the Wallabies after Ewen Mckenzie resigned from his post after their Bledisloe Cup defeat to New Zealand last month. He got off to winning ways last weekend with his side defeating a strong Barbarians side and will look to continue his winning start with a win in at the Millennium Stadium where they have a great record in recent years.

The Wallabies have won their last 5 games at the Millennium Stadium with Wales last win coming all the way back in 2008 where they defeated the Wallabies thanks to tries from Shane Williams and Lee Byrne.  You even have to go back to 2008 the last time Wales beat any of the so called powerhouses of the Southern Hemisphere with Wales losing 24 of their last 25 games with the win against Australia their only victory in the last 6 years.

In team news Gatland is able to name close enough to a full strength side with Jonathan Davies the only main absentee with the Clermont man missing out due to a shoulder injury.. With Davies missing out, George North comes into to play 13 with Liam Williams taking his place on the left wing. Rhys Webb is preffered to Mike Phillips at scrum-half with the Ospreys man enjoying an impressive start to the season.

As for Australia,  Michael Cheika has made a host of changes from the side that defeated the Barbarians last week with Slipper and Kepu coming into the front row and are joined by Simmons and Captain Hooper along with Sean McMahon who will make his full debut for the Wallabies coming in at  Openside Flanker replacing the injured Scott Higginbotham. In the backline, Cheika includes Phipps and Foley at 9 and 10 with Genia and Cooper dropping to the bench. Adam Ashley-Cooper and Leali’fano also return to the side in what is virtually the same side that lost to The All Blacks Last month.

In the first of 4 games for Wales in November, they will look to get off to winning ways and end their Southern Hemisphere Hoodoo. As for the Wallabies under new management,players will look to impress and make sure they are on the plane to England next year. All will be decided on Saturday in a game that will go down to the wire.