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Rugby Union: Australian tonic

Friday 23 October 1992 23:02 BST
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AUSTRALIA, still smarting over their defeat by Munster, were encouraged when three of their Test pack were passed fit for today's game with Ulster at Ravenhill. Rod McCall (neck), Willie Ofahengaue (shoulder) and Phil Kearns (shoulder and back) will all play.

With the Test against Ireland only a week away, the Wallabies coach, Bob Dwyer, is looking for victory over Ulster - who field seven internationals - as a tonic. He said: 'We don't want people to be thinking 'these guys are quite beatable and that all you have to do is kick high balls and rough them up a bit and they lose their cool'.'

Munster and Australia, who each had a player sent off in a brawl, are dealing with the incident through internal action. The Australian manager, John Breem, said: 'The episode is behind us. We have learned much from what happened on the pitch in Cork.'

Australia's Garrick Morgan and Munster's Mick Glawey were sent off and banned for four days.

There were other forwards involved at an earlier stage in the brawl, but there will be no public action taken by the management teams, although Australia's management has issued a warning about the consequences of foul- play. Breem said: 'We lost our discipline and our self control and that contributed to us losing the match.' Australia led 19-16 when Glawey and Morgan were sent off and Munster went on to win 22-19.

ULSTER: C Wilkinson (Malone); R Carey (Dungannon), M Field (Malone), M McCall (Bangor), K Crossan; P Russell (both Instonians), A Blair (Dungannon); D Elliott (Bangor), S Smith, P Millar (both Ballymena), P Johns (Dungannon), D Tweed (Ballymena), S McKinty (Bangor), B Robinson, G Hamilton (capt, both Ballymena).

AUSTRALIA: M Roebuck; D Campese (both New South Wales); J Little, T Horan, P Carozza (all Queensland); M Lynagh (NSW, capt), P Slattery; C Lillicrap (both Queensland), P Kearns, E McKenzie (both NSW), R McCall, J Eales, D Wilson (all Queensland), W Ofahengaue, T Gavin (both NSW).

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