Pain of defeat will inspire us next week, warns Gareth Davies

Davies admitted that the players were ‘gutted’ not to have beaten Australia to set up a last eight clash with Scotland – especially as the Wallabies were down to 13 men in the second half.

“Everyone's gutted in the changing rooms but we're looking forward to the quarter-finals now,” said the Scarlets man.

“We can definitely use this as motivation for next weekend.

“They were down to 13 men and should have capitalised on that,” he added.

“We didn't come away with any points and we have to give credit to the Australian defence for that. We were held up over the line three times. That's rugby for you.”

And Davies believes that having matched Australia – many people’s favourites to lift the trophy – Wales can go forward with confidence.

“Australia have been playing some of the best rugby in the World Cup so far,” he said.

“For the majority of the game we did match them but we failed to score at the key time and that's cost us the game.

“I thought some of the Aussie boys were outstanding.

“We were held up three times and on the third time I thought it was third time lucky and it had to be a try. It didn't quite go our way. Australia defended really well in that time.”

And last year’s victory over the Springboks at the Millennium Stadium could also be a factor next week, according to Davies.

“We're going to thrive off it,” he said. “We managed to beat them in the autumn so we'll look back on that game and work on a few of the things that went well ahead of Saturday.

“That Japan defeat did South Africa the world of good. They've been playing some great rugby since then and will be a tough challenge but it's one we're capable of meeting. “They called it the pool of death and we've come through that. One of the boys mentioned that no team has won the World Cup after finishing second in pool.

“That will spur us on as well and hopefully we can change that and go on to win this cup.”