Day of Australia Match

We started the day with a backs' meeting right after breakfast to fine tune the offensive and defensive play calling. After that it was the dreaded waiting game. I sat around and listened to music and played Sudoku. Once it was time to leave we piled into the vans for the nearly 45 minute drive to the pitch. We had our individual and team warmup and then our team run-through. I was feeling a lot less nervous than before the England match, but still really excited and ready to go. We came out strong in the first half with two tries. Australia made two penalty kicks so the score at halftime was 10-6 and that's how it would end. We played a lot of defense in the second half in our end of the field (despite a strong wind at our backs...) with one huge goal line stand. It was then that I felt our pride and determination the most, but we still didn't put everything together. The win was bittersweet - because we didn't score more points or get the bonus point (for 4 tries) we are now ranked 6th. We will play Australia (ranked 7th) again on the 12th. We returned to the hotel feeling disappointed even with the win (which is a strange feeling). We had dinner and then my birthday cake! Tomorrow we have almost the entire day free.