There is only 1 game this weekend but it promises to be a cracker as England host Australia at Twickenham. Here is my prediction.
First here is a link to my roundup of all the action from around the globe last weekend.
How did your round 4 predictions go?
8 from 11, the Pacific Island teams did better than I was expecting.
Here’s my 1 line prediction, read below of the full reasoning.
England v Australia
England are having a great year and continued that last weekend with a character defining victory over Argentina. Most people expected England to win but nobody was expecting them to have to do it with 14 men for nearly the whole game. So does that mean as England won 3-0 in Australia and have put this performance in that it’s an obvious win for England? No for starters England are missing 5 starting players from tour and with Daly suspended for that red card are down to the fifth choice winger. Those 5 players also include 2 of the very influential back row from that tour.
The Wallabies are also much improved since June. There have been a lot of new caps in this side since the Rugby World Cup and Cheika has admitted that he didn’t bring them into the setup as well as he could. He has talked about having to start again midseason so that they understood what was required of them. We have seen the fruits of that with much improved performances and results even if they did lose to Ireland last weekend. So much so that if they win this weekend they will go to second in the world rankings climbing above England.
This will be a hard-fought test match and I do think that England will maintain their winning record but only by a single score.
England by 5
#RugbyChat
Join the #RugbyChat on twitter for an hour of discussion reviewing the action on Tuesday. If you can’t make the hour then you can still give your view as the conversation keeps going over the following day.
DrivingMaul Newsletter
Don’t miss a post or video by signing up for the new weekly DrivingMaul newsletter.
