Warren Gatland hails the ability of southern-hemisphere sides to play past the whistle © Getty Images

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Wales coach Warren Gatland believes his side can end their eight-match losing streak against Australia in Cardiff on Saturday but that the result, whatever it is, has no relevance to the World Cup in 2015 when the teams will meet again.

"There's a lot of water to pass under the bridge before that," he said. "Last week [Tonga] was probably more important almost than this week for the World Cup in terms of being able to develop a bit of experience and depth.

. "I think we haven't spoken about Australia because we're confident," he said. "There's a lot of confidence in the side in terms of their own ability. I think with Australia, there's a lot of key players for them who've been regulars who aren't playing on Saturday. They're quite different to what we've faced in the past.

"You have to play [them] for 80 minutes and there are periods of the game where they are going to come at you and you are going to have to soak up some pressure. It's going to be physical. The game at the very highest level is based in certain matches on a lot of emotion, and you have to bring that emotion with you."

He said that the Australia game concluded a November with a difference. "People have got to be aware that, probably in the past, we've used the autumn a little bit differently. We've used it as preparation for the Six Nations because that's our bread and butter. That's a tournament. Now these are friendlies and we wanted to achieve in the Six Nations.

"Our focus has changed a little bit for this autumn. It's about when we're at full strength, we think we've got a pretty reasonable team. So we've targeted this autumn wanting to do better than we have in the past."

Gatland said a lot could be learned by New Zealand's last-gasp comebacks in last weekend's rugby league and union internationals. "It's that never-give-in attitude. We saw it in the rugby league as well. I can only talk about my own experiences. You fight until your last breath with everything you've got. That's the mindset.

"You try to bring that same attitude into the squads you are dealing with. With the Welsh team we've worked hard and are in great shape physically, and it's about transferring that into the little one-percenters that we are now talking about."