England vs Australia: Jamie George warns teammates that Wallabies are 'a different animal' this time around

Exclusive interview: England hooker believes the four victories over the Wallabies from 2016 will count for little given their recent win over the All Blacks

Jamie George believes Australia will be a much better team this weekend than the one they faced 12 months ago (Getty)

Jamie George has warned his England teammates that they face a “different animal” this weekend after Australia recorded their first victory over the All Blacks in eight attempts, and believes that if the forward pack do not assert themselves over their great rivals, they risk allowing themselves to be “bullied”.

The war of words between the England and Australia camps kicked off on Thursday as Wallabies head coach Michael Cheika accused England of trying to “bully” his half-backs in the past by deliberately targeting them with late tackles. Eddie Jones refused to fire back when this accusation was put to him, but on Friday the Australian spoke out to jibe Cheika by criticising his decision not to meet with match referee Ben O’Keeffe ahead of Saturday’s Test.

In the past, England have been able to expose a weakness in the Wallaby pack, particularly in the front-row battle, and memories of the destructive prop Andrew Sheridan wreaking havoc on the Australian scrum on more than one occasion have been rekindled whenever England get a shove on their opponents.

Last year’s results helped those memories, with England recording four straight wins against their rivals that included a 3-0 series whitewash on their summer tour Down Under, but George believes that the home side at Twickenham could be in for trouble if they do not get on top of a much-improved Australian side - albeit without influential lock Adam Coleman after he was ruled out with injury on Friday.

“You’ve always got to learn from your past experiences when you play against teams in the past and yes we’ve had really good results against Australia recently, but I think they’ve progressed hugely over the Rugby Championship in particular and had a good result on Saturday,” George told The Independent after the Wallabies beat Wales 29-21 last Saturday.

“We’ll try to take a few learnings away from the summer especially but at the same time we’ve got to review their most recent games and see how they’ve been playing recently because they’re a different animal than before.”


 George, Daly and Itoje have never lost to Australia (Getty)

George, named among the replacements for England for the 19th consecutive time this weekend despite starting all three British and Irish Lions Tests against New Zealand in the summer, added: “Generally the Australia forward pack are a very well drilled one, they’ve got a really good maul that we saw against Wales at the weekend but also very efficient with their scrum. They’re very aggressive as well and I think it’s going to be a big test for us this weekend that we need to make sure we get right. It’s going to be a big area for us to get dominance because if we get dominance there it will go a long way to winning the game.

“There’s always an extra edge to the games, they’re always fiercely competitive in all areas of the game. They’re a very physical team defensively and I think they try to bully teams. That’s something for us to get hugely excited about because we enjoy those physical games as well, and it’s probably why it has that extra edge every time we play against Australia.”

The fact that it took so long for the verbal barbs to start came from a larger than normal dissection of the England performance last weekend, where despite a 21-8 victory over Argentina the Red Rose were criticised for a poor performance.

Jones took the blame for the misfiring outing, though vehemently defended his side against claims that they did not show enough effort, and George admitted that there were mixed emotions among the players due to the win vs performance debate.

George is yet to start a Test for England (Getty)

However, he did also stress that there is an overriding sense of excitement among them at the amount that they can improve this weekend.

“The mood generally is pretty happy that we got the win but frustrated with how we got it,” he added. “I think there’s an element of excitement about how much more we can progress and the excitement is building towards Australia now.

“I wouldn’t say there’s necessarily a point to prove. The main thing we took away from that game was that we got the win, we’ve played Argentina four times in a year now and we’ve won all four so that’s hugely positive. We’re just hoping to put some wrongs right in this game against Australia.”

England will do so with two of their best players back in the side. Both Owen Farrell and Maro Itoje have been named in the match-day squad – the former restored at inside centre and the latter among the replacements – and George admits that while both George Kruis and Henry Slade performed well in their absence, having the two World Player of the Year nominees back will be a massive boost for the rest of the squad.

“A huge amount of what he [Farrell] brings to this team is that he’s our defensive leader, and Henry led the defence really well last week so I think they can both be really pleased about how they’re playing,” he said. “Obviously losing the likes of Maro is always going to be a big loss, but the guys filled in really well though.

“You’ve got to remember that it was our first game of the international season and in an ideal world they’re both world class players and we’d like to have those players in our team but at the same time there’s definitely an element of being our first game together and we’re still gelling.

“I think the combinations didn’t quite click as well as we wanted them to but that often takes a game or half of a game to get right, so we’ll make sure that those connections and combinations are right this Saturday.”

Jamie George was speaking to celebrate the launch of the RFU’s new partnership with Virgin Active, the first official fitness partner for England Rugby. The brands are collaborating to bring a digital fitness programme and new gym classes inspired by rugby to the public, launching in the new year.