A Sekope Kepu red card just before half-time didn't help matters, however, Australia were level with Scotland with 35 minutes remaining and given their recent form, would have still been favourites to chalk up win No.8 for the year.

Instead they were blown off the park by a Scottish team who have not forgotten the day Australia knocked them out of the 2015 Rugby World Cup quarter-finals.

Before June, the Wallabies had only lost to Scotland twice in nearly 35 years. Now, they have been defeated by them twice in the space of five months.

"I'm really proud of the team," said Wallabies coach Michael Cheika. "I know it didn't go well for us today."

"We just need to take that extra little step of maturity and we did a lot of good things this season despite what some of you guys think in particular."

Despite what people might think of the Wallabies and their year to date, there is no escaping the cold, hard facts of what happened on Saturday afternoon in Edinburgh.

The 29-point loss was Australia's biggest since the Bledisloe Cup opener last year but against a side other than New Zealand, the next worst is against South Africa in 2008 when they were thumped 53-8.

It is Australia's worst defeat in 118 years to a northern hemisphere side and the third most points the team has conceded in history.

In 90 years of matches against Scotland, never before have the Wallabies lost by such a margin.

Before the weekend, Scotland had only scored more than 24 points against the Wallabies once, and have now smashed their previous mark of 34 points set at the last World Cup.

Remarkably Scotland have not chalked up 53 points or more for 10 years and they have only done so now on nine occasions in 675 matches.

From not being switched on when Scotland quickly tapped off to awful defensive misreads, the Wallabies switched back to old habits despite making vast improvements since the beginning of the Rugby Championship.

"If you've seen our last couple of seasons, you're seeing a bit of a theme there where we've struggled in June coming out of Super Rugby and then we've slowly but surely got ourselves into the contest over the Rugby Championship," Cheika said. "[We] started the tour well and maybe having to do the [fitness] work in the middle [of the year] has taken its toll on us at the end."

The Wallabies finished 2017 with seven wins, two draws and five losses. Cheika said the team was still well placed for the World Cup in two year's time.

"We're over here with about 10 or 12 guys that aren't here but could be in in the mix for this squad, without a doubt," Cheika said. "Over the last two years we've looked to add some depth to our squad which we didn't have. We had our 27th debutant since the World Cup. A lot of those guys are in and around the squad. Maybe we are too young? A big thing for us it to look to improve our mindset and get away from not fully believing we can do the job regardless of the conditions.

"I think we've worked really well about not using excuses for ourselves and taking the hard road as we have all year."

Stephen Moore's final match at international level was not one to remember as Cheika paid tribute to a "genuine, authentic Wallaby".

"His attitude and character will be imprinted on this squad going forward," Cheika said. "I've been lucky to have him involved ??? from 2015 and beyond. It hurts him when the team is not seen in the right light and he will do anything for the team be at the top. Considering our situations over the last few years he has been an outstanding help to me. We've had a lot of battles on and off the field and he's kept the team up and hungry all the time."