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Australia kick off World Cup campaign with comfortable win over Georgia

  • Australia 35-15 Georgia
  • Ben Donaldson scores 25 points for Wallabies

Well, it’ll do for now. Australia are off and running at this World Cup, with their first win under Eddie Jones and further vital signs of progress. It was a little ragged in the second half, and Georgia missed numerous opportunities to make them extremely uncomfortable in the closing stages. But there was enough on display here in a sparkling first half-hour to suggest that Jones’s ideas are beginning to take, that the world’s ninth-ranked team can be more than mere makeweights at this tournament.

This is a young side, with new pages to write and new stars waiting to hatch. Mark Nawaqanitawase showed why he is being tipped for a big breakthrough at this tournament. The pack held firm against the strong Georgian scrum. The set piece was decent enough. But the star of the show, fittingly, was a Jones gamble: Ben Donaldson, the fly-half picked at full-back to bolster a fragile kicking game, and coming away with 25 points.

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from The Guardian https://ift.tt/k9ne5JE
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