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Steve Borthwick has responded to his critics impressively but England remain a work-in-progress - David Rogers/Getty Images
Steve Borthwick, England’s head coach, will have mixed feelings about the almost-imminent British and Irish Lions tour to Australia. He will be pleased that his team’s second place in this year’s Six Nations will have bolstered the selection case for many of his charges. On the other hand, I am sure he would have preferred to have his entire squad available for England’s summer tour to Argentina.
In interviews after the 68–14, 10-try thrashing of a hapless Welsh side, Borthwick stressed that he had not been set a specific target by the RFU for the competition. A second-place finish, when viewed against a very difficult opening three rounds, would meet any reasonable benchmark, and this table position ensures Borthwick’s tenure to the World Cup. Results are sometimes seen as the only measure of success, but Borthwick can legitimately identify signs of improvement in several aspects of England’s performance.
Whilst acknowledging the tries left unscored against them by France and Scotland, England’s defence began to take shape during this tournament. The long periods in the second half against Scotland, where they successively drove the Scots away from the English tryline, were what ultimately enabled them to record the narrowest of victories. At times, they are still caught narrow off strike moves but their scramble defence never lacked in effort. Going forward, the challenge is to solidify the guard and bodyguard positions around the breakdown and make sure a sufficient number of players fold around rucks to ensure they are not left undermanned when they have to defend multiple-phase attacks.
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Fin Baxter has given England’s scrummaging strength in depth from off the bench - David Rogers/Getty Images
England’s scrummaging has improved and that includes the crucial point of maintaining their performance when their front five are substituted. Fin Baxter and Joe Heyes deserve as much credit as the starting props, Ellis Genge and Will Stuart. The latter pair will now almost certainly be on the plane to Australia this summer.
Another conspicuous success over the contests has been their back row. There was no doubt, even before the start of the campaign, that England had sufficient depth here but what they showed was that the Curry twins can operate successfully as, effectively, twin opensides, without debilitating England’s ball-carrying threat up front. The challenge for the players and coaches is to match the periods where that option is best and when a larger player like Chandler Cunningham-South is preferable. Used properly, the flexibility to call on those alternatives and moving players like Ollie Chessum and George Martin back from the second row will pose different and difficult challenges for opposing teams and coaches.
Questions remain around England’s back three and centres, but the specific issues have changed and done so in Borthwick’s favour. Instead of struggling to identify prospective choices in the five positions, Borthwick has been able to see several new caps show that they deserve to be considered as possible longer-term selections.
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Figuring out how to make the most of Tommy Freeman’s attacking verve is a welcome conundrum for Borthwick - Dan Mullan/Getty Images
When you consider that George Furbank, Immanuel Feyi-Waboso, Ollie Sleightholme, Ollie Lawrence and Henry Slade were not even in the England starting 23, you can see how Borthwick’s hand of cards has been improved. Tommy Freeman became the first England player to score tries in all five of the tournament’s games and the welcome decision for the coach is how does he make the most out of Freeman’s power and try-scoring instincts?
There are still two years before the 2027 World Cup in Australia, but that will go quickly, especially as Borthwick will not be able to experiment with some of the possible centre and back-three combinations this summer. It is always difficult to weigh the cases of longer-serving players like Slade and Lawrence against players who have only just arrived on the international stage, like Tom Roebuck and Fraser Dingwall.
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Tom Roebuck can force his way into Borthwick’s World Cup starting-XV plans over the next two years - David Davies/PA
It is better to have this conundrum than not; it would be a lot better to have four, rather than two, years to solve it. If you look at past World Cup-winning sides you will see that their various team units, and likely variations thereof, are nearly all settled about 18 months out from the start of the competition.
When it comes down to basics, little changes can make a big difference in Test-match rugby. Against decent teams there will be momentum swings, particularly when there are yellow cards. Each team has ebbs and flows in fortune and the key is simply to make more of your dominant periods. England still have to prove they are capable of doing that repeatedly at the very highest level.
This Six Nations showed they have resilience and the durability to score tries late in games. What they must now do is ensure that any negative spells do not last as long as the 35 minutes directly after half-time in the Ireland game during which they conceded 22 unanswered points.
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