Even in defeat Australia captain Michael Hooper says his side were not too far off the mark and is confident that they can make the necessary improvements to beat Ireland.
The Six Nations champions' 26-21 victory in Melbourne last weekend set up a winner-takes-all finale against the Wallabies at a sold-out Allianz Stadium in Sydney on Saturday (11am).
Asked about the difference between the first two games, Hooper said: "Both very physical but probably on whose terms [the game was played] was probably the difference.
"Why they were different? I think our trust in our system of the individuals of the players on the field was much stronger, our ability to know who we had in each other’s line and do that was quite good in the first game so it was more physicality on our terms.
"You flip that to the second game and Ireland took it to us.
"Their ball retention was great and it tested us on the fold and tested us on the negative side and carried over the gainline a bit more.
Here’s your Ireland team for the series decider #AUSvIRL on Saturday. #TeamOfUs pic.twitter.com/aXOTQjLo0V
— Irish Rugby (@IrishRugby) June 21, 2018
"We weren’t able to get guys like David [Pocock] on the ball and Adam [Coleman] doing big shots and getting our guys out the back.
"We’ve had two games now, both teams have felt each other out. I’m sure they have cooked up a few things to try and catch us off guard as we have too.
"The fact that we could score points. Even with the game on the line we were able to put some really nice attacking phases together. We looked at that and said ‘that’s really nice’.
"In the negative of allowing them to control so much possession you go ‘well if we changed a couple of things here then we can actually get it back’.
"We weren’t that far off what we needed to do. Ireland did put together a good game and squeezed us really nicely, how they made us give away penalties.
#BREAKING l #Wallabies team to face @IrishRugby in the decider of the Mitsubishi Estate Ireland Series at @AllianzStadium.
— Qantas Wallabies (@qantaswallabies) June 21, 2018
TEAM: https://t.co/vfYr5oUlD1#AUSvIRL #GoldBlooded pic.twitter.com/wv5e9RO3Nf
"They controlled the game play and possession on the field really strongly.
"The momentum is going to swing, we know that. They are a class team, it’s not going to be all one-sided.
"You’ve got to embrace both sides of that and what we’ve worked on this week will allow us to have a bit more of that.
"As a stand-alone match, this is really exciting.
"That's the unique thing about this June series - it's a three-game shootout, really.
"We can come here and have a deciding game and be a fantastic spectacle. We have talked it up being a Grand Final, so yeah, it's going to be tough on the field.
"But just the buzz around, you look at your phone and people are messaging in, excited about the game, trying to snag a ticket or two. That's great for us as players and I am sure the people will enjoy it."
Follow Australia v Ireland on our live blog on RTÉ Sport Online and the RTÉ News Now app and listen to live commentary on 2fm from 10.45am (11am kick-off).
