England’s desperate dirt file is heartening for Wallabies … and hypocritical

There was a potential mindset problem brewing for the Wallabies heading into Sunday’s clash with England at Twickenham.

Last year, the Wallabies were received in London with a mix of derision and indifference, along with a splash of condescending sympathy. Some poor results in the months prior had prompted some English player podcast types to suggest the British and Irish Lions should not even bother touring Australia in 2025, given the one-sided slaughter that would surely unfold.

The Wallabies took all the shots and, after claiming a memorable win after the siren over England, produced all the receipts. “It’s always great to shut up critics, right?” Fraser McReight said with a grin.

The critics retreated like Homer Simpson into a hedge, and after the Wallabies put up a huge fight against the Lions and had a strong Rugby Championship, a different welcome has been rolled out. The Wallabies are a dangerous side who won’t be pushovers, say the British commentariat.

Which is a nice change, but the flattery also opened the door for the Wallabies to lose the sharp edge of an underdog, and be lulled into a cosier mindset.

Until the dirt file appeared, that is.

As detailed in a report in the London Telegraph that went live on Friday morning, England coach Steve Borthwick this week furnished the referee with a dossier of “illegal and dangerous” attacking clean-outs by the Wallabies during the Rugby Championships. Forty examples (of the Wallabies cleaning out from the side, essentially) were given to Georgian referee Nika Amashukeli during a routine meeting with Borthwick during the week.

Speaking on Friday in London, Wallabies captain Harry Wilson addressed the allegations from England and questioned their accuracy.

“I saw [the article] this morning. Firstly I’d like to question how many of [the clean outs] are illegal. To say they’re dangerous, I know they’re definitely not dangerous there too,” Wilson said.

“To think that we’re getting coached that way, there’s no way Joe Schmidt would coach a team to be illegal at the breakdown.

“I think we’ve had over 2000 rucks this year and for them to cherry-pick a couple of rucks out of it is quite amusing.

“We’re pretty excited for the opportunity to go out there and have a really good fair game and go out there and perform.”

It’s a ploy as old as time. Point out habitual crime by your opponent, supply video evidence and hope the referee will have it front of mind during the game.

If a media outlet somehow gets its hands on the complaint and the vision supplied to the referee, all the better. Public pressure is good pressure.

But England, it seems, have not really thought this one through, on a couple of fronts. The whole exercise could even blow up in their faces.

But first things first: side-entry clean outs? Really?

For rugby league fans, this is the equivalent of sending a dossier to NRL headquarters with 40 examples of incorrect play-the-balls.

The breakdown is a fast-moving, dynamic contest in rugby with multiple bodies involved. There can be well over 100 in a game and referees could find a penalty in most of them, but they don’t. They exercise discretion and mostly just ping the worst of it, so the game can keep going.

Like a teenager’s bedroom, it’s a managed mess, but when cynical or nasty stuff creeps in, it is mostly dealt with. Amid examples of unpunished illegality, the example of the Wallabies being “dangerous” in a clean-out was, strangely, Tom Hooper doing a croc-roll on the leg of All Black Jordie Barrett at Eden Park. It was spotted and punished with a yellow card and a disallowed try.

Every single team in professional rugby is a side-entry sinner. Roll the tape of a rugby game and you’ll have yourself a dossier in no time.

To pluck an entirely random example game from thin air, let’s take a look at England in their last Test match in Argentina in July. They won 22-17.

The first carry from England in the 13th second was followed up with a side-entry clean out, and ahead of England’s first try in the fourth minute, there were three more obvious examples.

England weren’t alone, mind you. In one Argentina phase (we’re still in the first four minutes here, by the way), the Pumas had seven attacking rucks and correctly cleaned out just once. There were no penalties.

There were more examples from England later in the Test, too. To look is to find.

But no one from the Wallabies will be clipping up a dirt file in retaliation. The word is the Wallabies’ camp is comfortable that Amashukeli is old enough and wise enough to see through the ploy and that he will referee both sides equally.

And here’s the potential self-own Borthwick may have inflicted upon his team by casting the first stone and putting the referee on high alert for side-entry sin.

In five examples in the opening 25 minutes of the second Test in La Plata, lock Alex Coles had a pair of dubious entries and tighthead prop Joe Heyes was good for three.

Heyes is starting against the Wallabies at Twickenham and Coles is on the bench on Sunday.

But on top of inviting scrutiny on your own players, the dirt file has also given the Wallabies a reason to rage again.

With England reportedly highlighting Australia’s beloved skipper Harry Wilson as the chief culprit, and using a loaded term like “dangerous”, the Wallabies will have their backs well and truly up again come kick-off. They’ll go from potentially complacent to definitely cranky.

It’s also a fair pointer to England’s low confidence levels, and their high concern about their capacity to contain the Wallabies’ high-tempo running game.

Unlike dour Borthwick-ball, the Wallabies will look to run, pass and ruck at speed, through to the final whistle. The dirt file suggests England are in need of a helping hand.