On Saturday night, a doctored image of Freddie Steward was circulating on social media; It showed the England full-back leaping 3 meters into the Twickenham night air to defuse another Wales aerial bomb.
This would have caused more than a few people to give further consideration because it detailed the essence of the truth, Steward’s excellence under the high ball. It’s the same for England, who have won eight of their last nine games; Their only defeat was a 16-15 loss to the world champion Springboks.
If this record appears to have been manipulated, a closer examination of this ranking reveals that there are no rivals in the top six of the World Rugby rankings. The last five of these victories have been by margins of one, six, three, three and now two points. Whatever these performances are worth, the reality is that England are constantly closing out games that until recently they would have overlooked. Against Wales, they completed their biggest first-half comeback at Twickenham by taking a 14-5 lead in the 72nd minute.
“That’s the growth of this team; “We find a way to overcome difficulties,” said second-place Maro Itoje. “Maybe a few years ago we would have spiraled but we took an honest look at ourselves at half-time, Steve gave us clear messages and slowly but surely we managed to turn things around.
“Maybe in the past when we’ve been down we’ve tried to chase the game a little too much. But what we’re trying to do now is trust our systems, trust our players and trust our plan. There have been some well-documented games where we didn’t start well and then we continued to spiral. That’s what we’re trying to change.”
A perfect example of this belief in his principles came when, 7-0 down with two men, Itoje screamed from the defensive line and smashed Ioan Lloyd deep inside the gain line from the Wales 22. next attack. “Again, this ties into what we just talked about about staying in the fight,” Itoje said. “We were 13-15 in terms of body count, so we were behind but we were in good position on the field and wanted to keep the pressure on them.”
England, head coach Steve Borthwick’s ‘4. He was particularly impressive in the final 20 minutes of what he described as the ‘quarter’. Last year England lost the fourth quarter in four of their first five games in charge of the Six Nations; The most painful was against Scotland at Twickenham, which led Borthwick to make pointed observations about his players’ fitness.
This was a trend that long predated Borthwick’s arrival and revealed not only physical but also mental weakness when it came to the game. “If you look at all situations, the last quarter of the Six Nations last year was a weak quarter for us,” Borthwick said. “We had points going… we let the points go there. I think we’re handling this as a team [and became] we were fresher at the time as we were doing a heavy training load and [also] handled it tactically.
“What pleases me most is the characters developed in this group and the fact that the players believe that they will find a way in difficult conditions, buy it and continue to fight in difficult conditions. “They remain in the struggle.”
Borthwick was right when he said England played “very smartly” in the second half, keeping Wales at bay by preventing them from going 22nd in the final quarter. Steward’s high-ball ability was crucial in this period (see video below) but so was the precise striking play of the halfbacks, highlighted by George Ford’s outstanding 50-22 performance.
According to Opta, their victory line success increased from 37 percent to 54 percent after half-time, which coincided with their increase in pace. Most impressively, after losing 6-0 on first-half penalties, the team conceded only one penalty after half-time to achieve Itoje’s pre-match goal. “Steve wrote it to the group and I put myself forward to say the number,” Itoje said. “Our goal last week was eight, so I said, ‘Let’s try to be better than last week with seven.’ Typically the coach sets what he wants, the expectation, but he brought it up to the group and I felt compelled to respond.”
Even though we come out of the World Cup with a third-place finish, stretching back to back-to-back Six Nations wins, it still feels like we don’t know how strong the current England team actually is. Like the Steward image, their footage feels like it’s been Photoshopped. A trip to Murrayfield to face Scotland followed by a home test against Ireland will teach us a lot, but whatever the results Itoje has vowed England will be no one’s plaything.
“Throughout the decades, the best England teams of the past have always remained in contention,” Itoje said. We want to position ourselves as one of these teams. Regardless of the scoreline, whether we win or lose, this is a non-negotiable for us; We want to stay in the fight.”