MELBOURNE - Australia coach John Connolly believes Ireland will present a much tougher challenge than England in next weekend's test in Perth.
The Wallabies beat England 43-18 in the second test on Saturday six days after a 34-3 win over the world champions in Sydney, and Connolly is expecting a tighter match against the Irish who twice lost narrowly to New Zealand in the past week.
"They won't give us anywhere near the opportunities that England gave us," Connolly said.
"(Flyhalf Ronan) O'Gara will control the field position, they will play a very strong field-position game and they will have a strong lineout and the scrum will hold up and they really squeeze a team," he added.
"It will be a totally different game. They don't play with any amount of width. We have to turn it up immeasurably."
England enjoyed plenty of possession against Australia but once again failed to capitalise, and Connolly was happy with the effort of his forwards. "I think we took a reasonable step in our scrum on both sides," he said. "We didn't appear to be under the same pressure as were last week."
Hooker Adam Freier suffered a foot injury against England, ruling him out of the one-off test against Ireland in Perth.
England coach Andy Robinson still believes his side can make a successful defence of the World Cup next year despite a run of five successive defeats.
"Definitely, there's a year to put this together with a new coaching team," Robinson said.
"We had quality rugby players, that's why we won the World Cup in 2003 but those players retired and it's now about growing another side," he said. "We've been in the mix and not been able to achieve that in the last two years.
"At present the system we have in England is developing good international rugby players but is not developing world-class rugby players."
Robinson left several senior players back in England to rest at the end of a demanding domestic season.
"There are a number of players who can step up from this tour and marrying that together with the players that were given enforced rests, I think there's a good side that can be put together that can take England forward," he said.
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