'Maybe it’s the biggest game in the professional era for Australian rugby'

The stakes could not be higher when the Wallabies take on Wales in Lyon on Sunday night with discipline and Tate McDermott the keys, according to the double World Cup winner.

It is simple for Tim Horan: the Wallabies have to beat Wales tonight or rugby union is in real trouble back home.

“Maybe it’s the biggest game in the professional era for Australian rugby because if you don’t make the quarterfinals for the first time in the Rugby World Cup that is huge. The ramifications of not making a quarterfinal are big,” said the man who in happier times for those Down Under lifted the Webb Ellis Cup in both 1991 and 1999.

The pressure on the under-fire Wallabies has only increased with the recent reports in the Sydney Morning Herald claiming that head coach Eddie Jones met with Japanese rugby officials over Zoom from Paris just days before the start of the World Cup.

"In the context of where rugby sits in Australia, the amount of tourists that are here supporting the Wallabies, the amount of people back home supporting the Wallabies, we need to win this game.

"We are always paddling for airtime in Australia with the other codes. For us, if you don’t get to a World Cup final things are tough. So, to not make a quarterfinal is going to make the next two years leading into a British and Irish Lions test series tough to be able to promote.

"A lot of fans in Australia they watch (only) the Wallabies and they are dictated by wins and losses for the Wallabies."

It is a stark message for a side that has lost six of its past seven matches, with the 22-15 defeat to Fiji last Sunday, part of a run that has seen the Wallabies defence leak a damaging 216 points in 2023.

Wallabies great Tim Horan shows off his ANZAC XV jersey from the 1989 Lions tour. (Photo by Jim Tucker)

The group’s inexperience has come under particular attack – with an average of 26, it is the youngest World Cup squad in 32 years – and Horan added his voice to those questioning Eddie Jones’ thinking.

“Maybe it’s a Quade Cooper, maybe it’s a Bernard Foley as a back-up 10. Coming into the Rugby World Cup with the youngest squad in the whole World Cup, you needed a little bit of experience around the team,” Horan argued. “Yes, you can look for two-to-four years down the track but you’ve still got to go well in this World Cup.”

One of Jones’ headline selections, the decision to bring 22-year-old Carter Gordon as the only recognised fly-half, appears to have backfired. The nine-cap man will start the must-win game looking on from the bench while utility back Ben Donaldson attempts to dictate play from No.10 for the very first time in his fledging test match career.

Add on the nagging need Australia have for a bonus-point win – Wales sit top of Pool C with 10 points, while the Wallabies and Fiji are locked together on six – and the picture is bleak.

Not that Horan has lost all hope.

"If we are single digit penalties awarded against us, I think we can win the game,” said the man who will commentate on the game for Australian broadcaster Stan. “Once we start to hit double figures, we will struggle.

"Discipline is really key after 18 penalties last week (against Fiji) and then the accuracy at the breakdown. Not to go too wide, too early to get exposed. That’s a pattern of play the Wallabies will have to balance with. You know, you’ve got two of the top six wingers in the game, those two wingers for Wallabies (Mark Nawaqanitawase and Marika Koroibete) and you’ve got to get them the ball. They have to get some width in their game."

There is one other bright spot for the rumoured 15,000 Australian fans who have descended on Lyon.

"Tate McDermott (returning Australian scrum-half), he’s the key. For me if the Wallabies are to win Tate McDermott has to be probably man of the match. They missed him last week,” Horan said, before delivering a final message to his successors in the shirt he served so well:

"They know there is pressure, they know there is support. It’s up to them now to probably take it out of Eddie Jones’ hands and do something special as a team, as individuals.”