And we’ll certainly back ourselves on fitness.”If Johnson and Back are exposed by younger, faster opponents with fatal consequences for England’s dream of a first world title, both men will bend the knee and accept the rule of Anno Domini. If, however, they outlast the likes of Harrison and Phil Waugh and bring these Wallabies to heel, they will tell Eddie Jones exactly where he can put his words of wisdom.. If they’re good enough, they’ll get on top of England.”That reference to youth led some observers to wonder if Jones might be covering old ground and hinting at whether the “Dad’s Army” element in the red rose pack – the Martin Johnsons and Neil Backs – could last the pace of a fast, fluent match As ever, he hinted cleverly “Fitness is going to be absolutely essential. You can still perform well in your mid-30s – I don’t think it’s an age thing, so much as a fitness thing. Giffin remains among the substitutes – a high-risk strategy by Jones, given the pressure it places on the ball-winning capacities of Justin Harrison and David Lyons – and there has been no move to fill the gap created by Darwin’s misfortune The prop decision is the more baffling of the two. Al Baxter, uncapped before this tournament and no great shakes during it, will start the final at tight-head, with Matt Dunning, even less experienced and generally considered to be a specialist loose-head, as back-up. The England coaches could scarcely believe their ears.”We have a young pack and they have no fear, because there is nothing for them to be frightened about,” said Jones, with a show of bravado wholly consistent with his usual pre-Test demeanour.

“All they have to do is go out there and play as well and as aggressively as they can. England, quietly and privately, feel Australia have missed a trick or two on the selection front for the final. They certainly expected Eddie Jones, the Australia coach, to call in an experienced international tight-head prop – either Glenn Panoho or, more likely, Patricio Noriega – to sit on the bench after Ben Darwin’s hospitalisation during the semi-final victory over New Zealand last Saturday.
They also believed Jones would promote David Giffin, the longest-serving lock available to the champions and a potent force at the line-out, to the starting XV ahead of Nathan Sharpe.Neither has happened. The Scotland flanker Martin Leslie was suspended for 12 weeks for kneeing the United States centre Jason Keyter in the head during their Pool B match, but the ban was reduced to eight weeks on appeal.The Fiji winger Rupeni Caucaunibuca was banned for two matches for punching the France flanker Olivier Magne, and the Argentina prop Roberto Grau was suspended for nine weeks and his front-row partner Mauricio Reggiardo for six after raking opponents’ faces with their hands against Ireland.. He was not included in the France squad for today’s third-place play-off against New Zealand.Betsen is the fifth player banned for foul play during the tournament. Willis accepted Betsen had not deliberately kicked Dawson in the incident which happened just before half-time, but judged that his actions were reckless.Betsen had sent a letter to Dawson, apologising for the incident, and while Willis took that into consideration when deciding what punishment to mete out, the judicial officer insisted that the French player should not escape a ban.”I explained to the judicial officer that I regretted the incident and that it was not something I did on purpose but a reflex,” Betsen said.The suspension will rule Betsen out of action until 29 December, meaning he will miss matches for his club side, Biarritz.

The France flanker Serge Betsen has been banned from all rugby for six weeks after being found guilty of kicking the England scrum-half Matt Dawson in Sunday’s World Cup semi-final.
He was cited after the match and the International Rugby Board judicial officer, Terry Willis, an Australian, decided punishment was necessary. Tindall was fantastic when he lost his place for the semi-final and Catty’s reaction now is just the same. I sometimes wonder whether it was a message to everyone when I was dropped. Everyone’s desperate to be in the 15, but more than anything, everyone’s desperate to win.”Ben Kay, the Aussies should know, is the first to agree it beats the hell out of watching the grass grow..

Lawrence Dallaglio, whose neck muscles seemed to be on the point of exploding as he sang the national anthem before the victory over France, doesn’t easily fit into the stereotype proclaimed by the Australians. Mostly, though, Evseev had the better of him.With time running away and emotions running over, Hughes had no choice but to demand a more direct approach from his team and within minutes of the restart it began to pay dividends, although nobody ran at the Russian defence, and the best save of the second half was made by Jones.This, Hughes had said, would be a game that would shape careers but ultimately it would end the international ones of several of his players. Some of the convulsions of his life and his career, not least when he lost the captaincy after a bout of stupendous light-headedness, would challenge even an average Australian’s belief that his own life is shot through unsurpassable drama and thrills.Dallaglio, imagining the pain of his team-mate Catt, said, “I didn’t agree with the decision to drop me when I was about to win my 50th cap last year, but what’s important is how you react to something like that. Winning.”And in the process there may be just a flicker of entertainment value. He also dredged up the pain of Australian defeat at Twickenham two years ago, when he took particular exception to the celebrations of “dust-mite” England scrum-half Matt Dawson. “They’ve never been humble winners and Dawson proved it that day,” sighed Tefu.Boring? Arrogant? The arguments will rage on for three more days, but all of them will only warm the sense of the England coach, Clive Woodward, that the noise being made by the Australians is in direct proportion to their concern about the possible outcome of the World Cup final.If they want boring, they may not have seen anything yet, Woodward implied when he announced the single change from last Sunday’s crushingly successful semi-final team, Mike Catt losing out to the restored physical strength of Mike Tindall “We can play a wide game. We can play whatever game we wish,” said Woodward, “but what we’re going to do for sure is play winning rugby That’s really our game.