Australia vs England match report: Owen Farrell's late try seals historic series win for Eddie Jones' side

Australia 7 England 23

Farrell pounced on George's grubber kick to wrap up the victory (Getty)

England’s history makers sealed a first series win in Australia at the fifth attempt with a staggering defensive display in the second Test in Melbourne to go 2-0 up with one match to play in Sydney next Saturday.

Owen Farrell scored an exultant breakaway try with five minutes remaining to finish off a Wallaby team who battered time and again at England’s white jerseys, but managed only one try from a line-out maul to add to the four they had plundered in the 39-28 defeat in the first Test in Brisbane last weekend.

In a dramatic passage of play that summed up England’s obdurate and opportunistic efforts, Australia’s Scott Fardy spilled the ball in a double tackle by Farrell and Maro Itoje, and the counter attack was created by a quintet of substitutes – Jack Clifford and Paul Hill launched Joe Launchbury and Courtney Lawes, with Lawes’ pass off the floor after the tackle taken on by Jamie George whose clever grubber into clear water was chased by Farrell. A dab of the ball with the instep of the left foot and a dive over the line gave Farrell his fourth Test try. The Saracens midfielder added the conversion to help him to 18 points in a match in which he continued his near faultless form with the goal-kicking tee.

There wasn’t quite the all-in punching of the “battle of Ballymore” between Australia and England in 1975, but some aggravated push and shove in the first half showed the emotions at work when George Kruis went off his feet to concede a penalty, and Chris Robshaw grabbed the neck of Nick Phipps who had done something similar to Ben Youngs.

Billy Vunipola of England breaks with the ball (Getty)

That 1975 match came in England’s first Test series in Australia, which the tourists lost 2-0. The same happened in 1988 and 2006 before a 1-1 draw in 2010. Now England have a chance to complete a unique clean sweep in 2016, and their captain Dylan Hartley said: “We’ll enjoy the little bit of history right now but the message is ‘we go again’ and finish the tour proud next week.” England’s Australian head coach Eddie Jones, who may rate this achievement higher than the Grand Slam won in Europe’s Six Nations Championship in February and March, concurred: “We’re not going to be satisfied unless we win 3-0.”

Melbourne may be Australia’s self-proclaimed sporting capital but AAMI Park served up a horribly sub-standard pitch, and the scrums were almost as much a battle for the players to keep their feet as they were a fascinating tussle between England’s tighthead Dan Cole and Australia’s hooker-captain Stephen Moore and returning loosehead prop James Slipper.

Take your pick as to whether Slipper began by buckling inwards, or Cole’s body position was skewed from the perpendicular as his critics including former Wallaby coach Bob Dywer had been complaining. By the half-hour mark, Australia had coughed up six penalties (their total in the first Test was a wounding 15), and England were 10-0 up with Farrell’s penalty added to the inside centre’s conversion of Hartley’s 19th-minute try from a driven line-out, set up by a nice kick-pass from fly-half George Ford to Jack Nowell.

That had led to a penalty kicked to touch instead of for points, and Australia went the same route for Moore’s reply in kind after 33 minutes, with Bernard Foley converting.

Farrell celebrates going over late on to seal the series win (Getty)

The period leading up to half-time epitomised England's huge heart and unbending will. Billy Vunipola mistakenly kicked the ball out thinking time was up, but a surge of 21 Aussie phases ended with Tevita Kuridrani knocking on, no score and no English yellow card either, though they had come close.

The British & Irish Lions of 2001 and 2013 won a Test in Brisbane before losing in Melbourne but England weren’t interested in repeating that.

Forced to make three times as many tackles as their hosts, the likes of James Haskell and Robshaw gave true meaning to the clichéd phrase of “putting bodies on the line”.

Australia had awarded four new caps last week and among the plethora of backs missing through injury or unavailability perhaps the man the Wallabies needed most was Matt Giteau for his playmaking at inside centre, although fly-half Foley gradually grew in influence, and Christian Leali'ifano came on to join him for the final quarter with Australia needing a converted try for victory, after Farrell’s penalty on 51 minutes had England 13-7 up. This was a bit of luck for England after assistant referee Nigel Owens picked up a possible barge by Farrell only for referee Craig Joubert and the television match official to punish a blocking run by Foley.

Moore contemplates defeat in the aftermath of England's victory (Getty)

While Robshaw, Haskell, Kruis and the front row were substituted in full justification of Jones’s six-two split of forwards and backs on the bench, Billy Vunipola and Itoje simply ploughed on, brilliantly. It was the remarkable Itoje’s 25th start for club and country in the 2015-16 season, and the 21-year-old second row from Saracens has won the lot.

He was still there for the scrum penalty in the last play of the match that set Farrell up for a final, scoring swipe of the boot from just beyond the Wallaby 10-metre line.

The win took England up to second place in the world rankings above their hosts, and among the records that tumbled, it was England’s biggest margin of victory over the Wallabies in Australia, beating the 11-pointer in Brisbane last week and in Melbourne by Martin Johnson’s team in June 2003.

It was also England’s sixth win in eight meetings with Australia since mid-2010 – highlighting more than ever the hurt of the World Cup result last October when the Wallabies won at Twickenham.