Wallabies face injury concerns after rugby win over Barbarians

SYDNEY: Australia's Wallabies scraped home over the Barbarians on Saturday but their 31-28 win came at a cost with injury concerns ahead of next week's northern hemisphere tour.

Former skipper Stephen Moore scored the match-clinching try for the second-string Wallabies seven minutes from time to save Michael Cheika's blushes in the coaching battle against Barbarians boss Alan Jones.

Moore's try came against an under-manned Barbarians, who were left without star backs Taqele Naiyaravoro and Quade Cooper after both were sinbinned for late indiscretions.

The Wallabies finished fivetries-to-four winners, but Cheika was left with injury concerns ahead of his selection of a touring squad for the four-Test tour to the northern hemisphere week.

Key men Jack Dempsey and Lukhan Tui both limped off with hamstring injuries.

Cheika is set to name his tour squad on Sunday and rested most of his star players for the Barbarians match ahead of next weekend's Test against Japan in Tokyo en route to the United Kingdom.

The BaaBaas led 21-12 at halftime starting next playing a razzle-dazzle brand of rugby.

Naiyaravoro (two), Andrew Ready and Tom Banks were the Barbarians' try-scorers.

Duncan Paia'aua (two), Henry Speight, Dempsey and Moore crossed for a Wallabies team featuring just two starters from the side that conquered the All Blacks 23-18 in Brisbane last week.

The Wallabies ran in three second-half tries to take home the spoils against the invitational side, playing in Sydney for the first time since 2009.

Captain Cooper and winger Naiyaravoro both received yellow cards inside the final ten minutes after the Barbarians had taken a 28-24 lead on a Naiyaravoro try which was set up by a Cooper cross-field kick in the 67th minute. After Cooper was sin-binned for a high tackle on Israel Folau, the Wallabies capitalised on their two-man advantage when Moore barged over from a rolling maul to score the matchwinner with seven minutes left to play.

It was close to a triumph for Jones, the former coach of the Wallabies in the 1980s and nowadays a prominent radio broadcaster.