Fresh from another defeat in his second stint as Wallabies head coach, Eddie Jones has fired a warning in the All Blacks' direction, before the two sides meet in Melbourne later this month.
After replacing Kiwi Dave Rennie, who was sacked as Wallabies head coach at the start of 2023, Jones hasn't yielded the hoped-for lift.
Last week, Australia opened the Rugby Championship with a 43-12 hammering from a second-string Springboks side that had sent their best players to New Zealand a week early.
Then, after taking a 31-27 advantage over Argentina in Sydney on Saturday night, the Wallabies snatched defeat from the jaws of victory to fall to a 34-31 loss.
Now 0-2 in his second stint as Wallabies head coach, Jones' next task won't get any easier.
In two weeks, Australia conclude the Rugby Championship against a high-flying All Blacks side at Melbourne, before a return clash at Dunedin a week later.
They conclude their Rugby World Cup preparations with a warm-up against hosts France at the end of August.
Given the class of their opponents, it's more than conceivable the Wallabies head into the World Cup with five straight defeats under their belt, but Jones, who is never shy of stoking the fires, has warned the All Blacks of the coming weeks.
"It's interesting, isn't it?" said Jones. "In the first two games, we scored two super tries early in the game.
"We move the ball with fluency and quickly, it's how we want to play, but we're not able to sustain that at the moment.
"I can give you a fantastic, plausible reason - but you're not going to believe it, so I'm not going to give it to you.
"Whilst it seems doom and gloom at the moment, it's not. Beating a side here is a fair bit of optimism that we'll be able to change fairly quickly in the next couple of weeks.
"If I was the All Blacks, I'd look out."
With time ticking on the Wallabies' preparations for the World Cup, Jones insists his side aren't far from turning the ship around and one moment could ignite the whole campaign for the struggling Australians.
"We're going to get a lot better," he added. "Something will happen.
"It might be Richie Mo'unga runs, offloads, we intercept, we take a try and the whole team changes. It'll be something like that'll happen and the team will change, that's all we are away from that.
"I know it's sort of a bit airy fairy, but that's what happens to teams. It happens in life, something happens that changes the dynamics of the team.
"It's just not there, not happening at the moment - but it will."
