The Wallabies head off to South Africa this week amid mounting unease over which direction they are heading under coach Robbie Deans a year out from the World Cup.
These are testing times for the Wallabies, coming off their record-equalling ninth straight loss to the All Blacks and venturing into South Africa's Highveld where they haven't toppled the Springboks since 1963.
Trumpeted by the Australian Rugby Union as ushering in a 'generational change' when he was unveiled as the Wallabies' first foreign coach in December 2007, Deans, instead, has a growing number of doubters.
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The stats are not palatable reading for the man who came into the Wallaby job as Super rugby's most successful coach winning five titles with New Zealand's Canterbury Crusaders.
Deans has just over a 54 percent success rate with the Australian team, winning just 19 of his 35 internationals in charge inside three years.
In contrast, predecessor John Connolly had 64 percent success, Eddie Jones 57 percent and Rod Macqueen 79 percent.
Deans was viewed as the Wallabies' saviour in the wake of their shattering quarter-final exit to England at the 2007 World Cup in Marseille and employed with the expressed purpose of rebuilding for a serious crack at the 2011 tournament in New Zealand.
Three years on and there are increasing misgivings about the Wallabies' progress under Deans and whether the two-time winners of the Webb Ellis Trophy can make an impact at next year's World Cup.
Alan Jones, the coach of the 1984 Grand Slam-winning Australian team, recently declared: "We're going down the wrong track. We've got to turn somewhere and turn before there's a big accident further up the road.
"When are we going to get out of this death cycle and start playing rugby that's interesting."
Bob Dwyer, the 1991 World Cup-winning coach, is equally scathing about the Wallabies under Deans.
"There is something seriously wrong with the Wallabies. Either the players are not good enough, or the coaches are not good enough -- or, maybe, a bit of both," he said.
"Certainly there is no consistent progress, nothing to suggest to us loyal band of followers that there is even a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel."
Even his employers are getting twitchy over Deans's lack of cut through deep into his four-year contract.
ARU boss John O'Neill has indicated Deans will be the man to lead the Wallabies to the 2011 World Cup regardless of results, but recently voiced his concerns.
"The pressure is on all of us, the (ARU) board, me, Robbie, the team," O'Neill said.
"We still believe he's the right person for that job to take us through to the World Cup. But I think the dogs will be barking a bit and we just have to respond.
"What worries us is that we appear to be further away than what we were a year ago. In any team sport you have to ask yourself 'do you have the cattle'. We believe we do but it's time they to start delivering week in, week out."
Critics have also been agitating about the Wallabies' one-dimensional attacking approach under Deans.
"The 'one pass, crash ball' style of attack continues to be our favoured option," Dwyer said.
"If only they understood that this is also the favoured option for the defending team as well; it is ridiculously easy to defend."
The Australian newspaper lamented after the recent loss in Christchurch: "Once it was the All Blacks and the rest of the world reacting to Australian initiatives.
"Now it is the Wallabies who are playing catch-up and seemingly every time they plug one leak, another weak spot gives way.
"(All Blacks coaches) Henry, Hansen and Smith are comprehensively outcoaching Deans and his staff."
But biting the bullet and sacking Deans a year out from the World Cup is seen as a bridge too far for some.
"Putting another coach in place will not make the Wallabies a better playing unit all of a sudden," former Wallaby hooker Brendan Cannon wrote in The Daily Telegraph.
"All of us know Deans is a very good coach. We'll create more problems, pressure and expectations by getting rid of him and bringing someone else in."
