By Ed Davies
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia coach Eddie Jones said he was 100% confident he could turn the Wallabies around before the World Cup despite a last- gasp loss to Argentina handing them a second defeat of his second reign as coach.
The error-prone Wallabies looked like they had got out of jail with a Mark Nawaqanitawase intercept try five minutes from time, only for the Pumas to grab a winner in the last few seconds.
“We’re all really disappointed … we put a lot into that, though we just couldn’t put enough pressure on the opposition,” Jones told reporters at Parramatta Stadium.
“Every time we got in position to put pressure we either gave the ball back or didn’t defend hard enough. So there’s a couple of things we need to fix which we can fix with a lot of hard work.”
Jones’s first match back in charge was a 43-12 loss to the Springboks last week and with two tests against the All Blacks to come before the Wallabies head to Europe for the World Cup, there is a good chance they will arrive in France without a win.
The former England and Japan coach said he was convinced the Wallabies remained on the right path and that their fortunes could change quickly.
“Sometimes what you’re doing doesn’t come out in performance and it takes another game or one moment in the game,” he said.
Talking about the positives in the performance, Jones praised the team for battling, but noted how they were a bit like an old car at the moment.
“You fix the handbrake and then the next day the windscreen wipers break and we’re a bit like that at the moment,” he said.
“Last week our set piece wasn’t good this week our set piece was good. Last week we didn’t attack this week we did attack but our decision making around the ball was poor.
“So this is a bit of a process we’ve got to go through, as painful as it as hard as it is, and the team we are today is a long way from the team we want to be tomorrow, but you know we’ll keep working on it and we’ll get it right.”
(Reporting by Ed Davies, editing by Ed Osmond)
