Wallaroos crush Wales in final World Cup warm-up
On a cold and wet Friday night at North Sydney Oval, full of red jerseys with the British and Irish Lions in town to take on the Wallabies on Saturday, Australia responded in the best possible way to their 21-12 upset loss in Brisbane last week.
Both sides made a host of changes from the Ballymore clash, and visiting coach Sean Lynn was forced into an early substitution, with Georgia Evans replacing the hobbling Alex Callender.
Against the run of play on 16 minutes, 2024 Wallaroos player of the year Maya Stewart, back from knee surgery and starting in the side's final Test before the World Cup gets under way in England next month, dived over in the corner.
Another winger in Jasmine Joyce-Butchers scored in her 50th Test for Wales, before flyhalf Faitala Moleka extended the hosts' lead and Samantha Wood slotted her second conversion for 14-5.
After Welsh prop Gwenllian Pyrs was shown a yellow card and sin-binned for a deliberate knock-on, Aussie hooker Katalina Amosa, No.8 Tabua Tuinakauvadra, twice, and replacement flanker Ashley Marsters crossed the stripe for Jo Yapp's side in the second 40 to give the majority of the 4561 crowd a happy start to the weekend.
The final missed conversion with two minutes remaining meant Wales' 37-5 defeat last September in Cape Town remains their record loss against Australia.
The Wallaroos will now focus on Samoa in their opening World Cup pool game in Salford on August 23.
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