Young guns Freddie Steward and Marcus Smith scored the tries and England’s streetwise peloton led the disturbance while coach Eddie Jones masterminded a second series win over his home country after the 2016 3-0 sweep.
Australia scored tries via Tom Wright and Folau Fainga’a to a sold-out 43,274 crowd at the Sydney Cricket Ground, but for all their attacking brilliance, their accuracy failed them too often at crucial moments.
“We had to fight like anything today, they would always throw it around, so we had to defend well,” Jones told reporters.
“This was more difficult than 2016. We cherish this team on this tour. I am very happy with the development of this team, it has been excellent.”
Little had split the games over the series, with the Wallabies taking the opening test 30-28 in Perth and England, hitting back with a 25-17 win in Brisbane last week.
After being blown away in the first half in Brisbane last week, Australia had the better of the first half with some fierce runs, but still managed to return to the locker room 11-10 behind.
England’s Owen Farrell had opened the scoring with a penalty 17 minutes into the game, but the Wallabies reacted quickly with a fine effort from winger Wright, who busted the right wing before exchanging passes with Nic White and coming down.
Australia’s flyhalf Noah Lolesio added the extras and a penalty on the half hour, but Farrell narrowed the deficit almost immediately with his second three-pointer.
A lack of discipline from the Wallabies handed England another penalty just before half-time and they kicked to hit, pounding the home defense until Steward managed to find a narrow slit to hit the left corner.
England returned after the break with the same kind of physicality as in Brisbane, and a third Farrell penalty and an opportunistic try from Marcus Smith gave them a 21-10 lead after 55 minutes.
Lolesio had knocked the ball out of his hands and Smith jumped on it to run and score.
Australia knew the series was on the line and laid siege to the England line, finally getting their reward in the 66th minute as substitute hooker Fainga’a made his way to narrow the deficit to 21-17.
Encouraged by the crowd, the Wallabies hammered away for a winning try, but the England defense held out to almost certainly secure their coach’s job until next year’s World Cup.
“We created a lot of chances, we just weren’t clinical enough,” said Australia coach Dave Rennie, who had no 11 top players due to injury or suspension.
“It was disappointing, because at this level you have to seize your opportunities. It hurts.”