Wallabies backrower Scott Fardy says Australia has to adjust its approach at the breakdown to avoid more penalties.
Opposition flyhalf Owen Farrell made the Wallabies pay for the ill-discipline, kicking six penalties from seven attempts on the night.
Fardy was one of the Wallabies who found himself in trouble with referee Romain Poite on Saturday night and said Australia needed to avoid those situations in the second Test.
“Discipline's a big part of it, making sure that those 50-50s if they’re not on 100 per cent that we’re pulling out and not making bad decisions,” he said.
“I, myself, was guilty of a few of those where I thought I was doing the right thing but turns out I wasn’t and we can’t let those things happen and that's what got England into the game.
“Six penalties, when you make four tries to two before the 79th minute and you're still behind, it’s a disappointing thing and guys like myself have got to make sure they’re making better decisions around that.”
The biggest lesson from the lopsided count, Fardy said, is that the Wallabies need to adapt quickly to interpretations to avoid handing points away so easily.
“We need to adjust quickly to what they want and get the communication right,” he said.
“I’m not sure who we’ve got this week. They’ll tell us what they want pretty early.”
Fardy said adjusting to Poite’s view was a challenge but they couldn’t point the finger at interpretations.
“That’s rugby though isn't it?,” he said.
“There’s always a grey area about decisions.
“It’s frustrating, people message me all the time and say it’s frustrating in this game and the difference between one referee to another and what happens.
“But at the end of the day we’ve got to make sure as a team it doesn't affect what we do and we do it well.”
Outside of their disciplinary issues, Fardy said it wasn’t panic stations for the Wallabies, who will be looking to even up the series this weekend.
“We weren’t that bad,” he said.
“To score four tries in your first outing wasn’t a bad effort but credit to England, they played their game and got the result.”
