What next for woeful Wallabies?

Robbie Deans has privately expressed his amazement at the soft mentality of the Wallabies.

Where losing is accepted all too easily, as long as the team hotel is five-star and serves a decent café latte.

Former Wallabies skipper George Gregan summed up their thinking a few years back when he said passion was an over-rated commodity in international rugby.

God help us when playing for your country is treated as a job.

The Wallabies' pathetic performance in losing 9-8 to Scotland at Murrayfield at the weekend was ineptness personified.

The Scots would be flat-out beating Sydney's top club rugby outfit but they didn't need to stretch themselves - just tackle all day - to beat the Aussies for the first time in 27 years.

The game plan is simple when you play the Wallabies; just wait for them to stuff up by taking the wrong option or turning over the ball.

You won't have to wait long.

Australia enjoyed 70 percent of possession against Scotland and came up with one try at the death.

What went before it was absolutely pathetic - and a foot-through-the-television exercise in frustration for the deluded fools who stayed up until the middle of the night to tune in.

To think that this is a squad that spends just about every waking moment together working on their skills.

They train and train and train ... and seemingly get worse with every match.

They may be professionals by definition of them being paid for their services, but they are so far behind the high levels set by their amateur predecessors that it's laughable.

No wonder there are quite justifiable calls for them to be put on win/loss bonuses.

There's nothing quite like a cut to the pay packet to spark the passion that Gregan deemed surplus to needs.

The current mob spoke of their desire to emulate the deeds of the 1984 Grand Slam-winning Wallabies - and folded after ticking off just one of the fours game they needed.

As for Deans?

Well, it is now seven losses in the last 10 Tests.

And Deans' overall record as coach is 14 victories from 27 outings.

His arrival was heralded as the best thing to lob out of New Zealand since Rachel Hunter.

It's starting to look like we got Dave Dobbyn instead.

But it's too simplistic to blame the current malaise on the Kiwi's shoulders.

He's bought into a building that looked okay from the outside but was rotting at the foundations.

The restoration job was bigger than anyone thought. He is still the best man for the job.

But his team will return to Australia with the 15-a-side game stuck firmly at the crossroads.

Rugby, Wallabies-style, is boring, the players over-paid and, most alarmingly for John O'Neill and his cohorts, the punters are deserting the game in their thousands.

All this when you're about to start trying to sell a fifth Super rugby team.

What have we done to deserve more rugby?