England v Australia: Wallabies can do a lot of damage, warns Flood

Toby Flood has warned England not to be fooled by Australia’s heavy 33-6 loss to France, insisting the Wallabies have the ability to punish the Red Rose at Twickenham on Saturday.

Stuart Lancaster’s men eased to a comfortable 54-12 victory over Fiji in their opening autumn international, with Charlie Sharples scoring two tries in an impressive display.

England’s thoughts now turn to winning the Cook Cup, and Flood encouraged the Red Rose to seize the initiative in the opening 20 minutes to test an Australian side struggling with injuries and lacking confidence.

“Whether Australia are unstable or not as a side is an interesting one because I don’t trust the result against France,” Flood said.

“The anomaly of France winning 33-6 is similar to Australia putting 50 points on the French two years ago. Both sides have the ability to do a lot of damage.

“I see them as a side that went 18-18 with New Zealand. Of course, they have had a few issues and the injuries will have had an impact on the continuity of the side.

“We will look to get an ascendancy in the first 20 minutes and drive home our advantage because if we can turn the screw in the first 20 minutes then it will make a big impact.”

On Tuesday, Australia winger Digby Ioane said he was looking forward to facing England’s “good-looking wingers”, and Flood laughed off the 27-year-old’s comments.

“I don’t really know who he could be talking about,” Flood added. “Is he talking about Sharples with his bean head or Chris Ashton with his see-through skin? I can see what he means about Ugo Monye, to be fair. He is an attractive man.

“The Aussies have got some lookers too. I have got my own scoring system, I will do it at home.”