It was a "dream come true," making his Test debut and scoring a crucial late try to help the Wallabies to a 32-23 win over Japan at Oita Stadium on Saturday afternoon.

But the word that first comes to mind is "rattled". Tensions were high as the ACT Brumbies hooker came on with the game in the balance.

"I was just so nervous all week, and when the game was in the balance, I wasn't sure if I would get on or not and luckily snagged nine or 10 minutes," McInerney told Stan Sport post-match.

"It's unbelievable. I could throw out some clichés, dream come true, obviously something I have worked for since I came into the Brumbies but I never thought I would achieve it. It's absolutely surreal. To do it here in Japan, in Oita, I'm lost for words."

MORE RUGBY UNION

His first Test try came in the same corner James Slipper scored his in. The difference? It took Slipper 96 Tests to get across the line. It took McInerney nine minutes.

"He was telling me before I got on when we were on the bench there, 'mate that's my corner there'," McInerney said when asked if he should rename 'Slipper's corner' to 'Connal's corner'.

"I'll leave it to Slippy, he was saying it took him 96 games so I'm just so lucky to do it in one. I don't want to take away from the effort from all eight games. It was all the set-up."

Veteran flyhalf Quade Cooper has so far played within himself following his return to the Test arena, but he decided to wind back the clock this time around.

There was a moment early on when the right foot step turned defenders inside out and an offload hit its mark to put the visitors ahead. He made it look easy. His fingerprints were all over three Wallabies tries.

But a cutout pass picked off by Ryoto Nakamura kept the Brave Blossoms in the contest, and left Wallabies fans wondering if the side that beat South Africa and Argentina four times from as many starts were about to be upset by Japan.

The Australian win was far from convincing in a game played at a frenetic pace.

The Wallabies lost fullback Reece Hodge to a pectoral injury in the 14^th minute, with Andrew Kellaway moving to fullback and Jordan Petaia joining Tom Wright on the wings.

Hodge is in doubt for the remainder of the tour in a blow which could leave Australia without a recognised fullback in Europe, though he will travel.

A late try for McInerney off the back of a rolling maul would ultimately sound the death knell for the Brave Blossoms. The performance was not the polished one Australia would have hoped for, but much of that can be put down to the rise of Japan in world rugby.

""A bit rusty, fairly frustrating. We're happy to win. We'll be better for that game, and they were a good side. Every time we gave them a bit of a sniff, they hurt us," Rennie said.

"We were looking from up top and we thought they were out on their feet a number of times. We just lacked a little bit of accuracy at key times and we lacked a bit of patience.

"It's a good learning for us, we got a lot of good go-forward and good carries. We probably overplayed. It will be quite different to what we'll play over the next three [Tests]."

AT A GLANCE

Spring Tour: WALLABIES 32 (Tom Wright, Jordan Petaia, Taniela Tupou, Rob Leota, Connal McInerney tries; Quade Cooper 2 conversions; Cooper penalty) bt JAPAN 23 (Lomano Lomeki, Ryoto Nakamura tries; Rikiya Matsuda, Yu Tamura conversions; Matsuda 2, Tamura penalties) at Oita Stadium.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: