Last-gasp Wallaby win does little to cheer critics

SYDNEY (AFP) –

Australian fly half Kurtley Beale scores a try in the final seconds to win the rugby union match between Wales and Australia at the Millennium Stadium, in Cardiff, Wales, on December 1, 2012. Australia won the match 14-12.

The Wallabies’ last-gasp win over Wales in Cardiff at the weekend rounded off an underwhelming season but was enough to save coach Robbie Deans’s job, Australian newspapers said.

A try by playmaker Kurtley Beale with just seconds remaining condemned Wales to a dramatic 14-12 defeat — Australia’s eighth consecutive win over the Welsh.

It wrapped up a European tour that saw the Wallabies beat England, Italy and Wales after a defeat to France in their opening game, but rugby writers were left unimpressed.

“Given the Wallabies’ year, it was entirely appropriate that even Kurtley Beale’s brilliant late try against Wales came with a caveat,” The Sydney Morning Herald’s Paul Cully said.

“The game had been won but not by the margin needed to reclaim the number two ranking in the world.

“Australia finish the year lower than where they began, with just one win from six games against the world’s top four sides and without any silverware: the season has been a failure, although one with mitigating factors.”

Australia’s Dave Dennis (L) jumps with Wales flanker Aaron Shingler in a lineout during the international rugby union match between Wales and Australia at the Millennium Stadium, in Cardiff, South Glamorgan, Wales, on December 1, 2012. A try by playmaker Kurtley Beale with just seconds remaining condemned Wales to a dramatic 14-12 defeat — Australia’s eighth consecutive win over the Welsh.

Cully said all the nagging doubts about the side’s direction under Deans were present for most of the game at the Millennium Stadium.

“A lack of guile with ball in hand. The apparent determination to kick the ball away as a strategy rather than a series of individual decisions, and to do it with a lack of accuracy,” he said.

“Fortunately, these Welsh are paralysed by a chronic lack of self-belief, as well as a few key injuries.”

The Australian’s Wayne Smith, a trenchant critic of Deans, said following the European tour that Australian rugby officials would undoubtedly decide to stick with him.

Smith said for long periods in Cardiff, the Australians looked about as “dangerous and exciting as an accountants’ convention”.

The Sydney Daily Telegraph’s Iain Payten agreed that any pressure building on Deans within the Australian Rugby Union boardroom was likely to have petered out.

“The Wallabies ended the year ranked third and among the top seeds for the 2015 World Cup, and Australia’s victory over the Welsh was symptomatic of many Wallaby performances in 2012 — ordinary attack and bang-on the average of one try per game, but with great spirit and resolve to claw out a win,” he said.

The Wallabies face the British and Irish Lions in three Tests at home next year.