Ireland and the Wallabies play for the Lansdowne Cup on Sunday, in the hosts’ first match of the autumn internationals.

The sides' most recent clash saw Ireland go down 18-12 in Melbourne in June 2008, but two of Australia's last three visits to Dublin have finished in victories for the home side - 18-9 in November 2002 and 21-6 in November 2006.

Leinster winger Fitzgerald said: "We probably have a target on our backs, coming into the autumn internationals as Grand Slam champions and looking forward to the Six Nations as well.

"That's a positive thing though. We've got to look at that as another challenge that the squad's got to live up to and another challenge for us to try and overcome.

"Everyone's looking forward to it, we're really motivated for this autumn series and doing well against southern hemisphere opposition.

"At this point, everyone's just hoping they get into the team and the match-day squad, because there's massive depth and competition for places."

Fitzgerald knows Australia captain Rocky Elsom well from his time at Leinster. They were part of the team that won the Heineken Cup this year.

And he expects the Wallabies back row star to be a threat in Dublin.

"Any time you play against an Australian team, they have quality players and have massive talent in the side.

"They have a few game-breakers and obviously we know one of them very well - Rocky Elsom - we all know how good he is!

"No matter when you play Australia, they're going to be very tough to beat. If you don't play to the best of your ability, then there's no way you're going to beat them.”