All the talk about England being in crisis is misplaced. A crisis suggests an aberration. Rather England are marooned in mediocrity.
On Sunday, statistician extraordinaire Russ Petty came up with a doozy: in the past 20 years, England have won just 27.3 per cent of their matches against teams who finished the year ranked in the top four. Steve Borthwick’s record is a pitiful one win in 10 – against Ireland in this year’s Six Nations – yet this is hardly bucking a trend.
Since 2004, they have only twice beaten the team who finished that year ranked world No 1, under Stuart Lancaster against the All Blacks in 2012 and in 2021 against South Africa under Eddie Jones.
For all their resources – the playing numbers, the balance sheet – England remain an average international rugby team, capable of the odd upset but otherwise firmly rooted around mid-table. If they were a Premier League team they would be Bournemouth.
Much as he did when he was captain, Borthwick appears as the punching bag for the run of five successive defeats. But the responsibility for the systemic issues with talent development lies with Bill Sweeney, the Rugby Football Union chief executive who fancifully proclaimed England should “always be contention for Six Nations and Grand Slams”, and his sidekick Conor O’Shea.
Consider this: which England players get into the Springboks first XV? At a push, Marcus Smith and Alex Mitchell. Then ask yourself who gets into a Springboks second XV? Immanuel Feyi-Waboso and Sam Underhill, probably, and Maro Itoje, on a good day, which was certainly not Saturday.
Someone such as centre Andre Esterhuizen, who was deemed surplus to requirements at Twickenham, would not only walk into the England first XV but become a cornerstone of the entire team.
Telegraph Sport understands that Borthwick is closely monitoring Bristol Bears’ Benhard Janse van Rensburg, who would qualify for England on residency but barely appears as a speck on the Springboks’ radar. Any one of South Africa’s battalion of tightheads would be an upgrade on England’s present options.
As unpalatable as some will find this, there is an argument to say that England are actually a well-coached team under Borthwick. Smith’s faked dropped goal, which led to Ollie Sleightholme’s early try against South Africa, was brilliantly designed. So too Chandler Cunningham-South’s opening try against Australia.
Statistics from Opta show that England have a positive points differential for the first quarter and third quarters of their Test matches this year, when the coaches’ messages are still ringing in their ears.
The problem comes when the picture changes, the plan goes out of the window and the players are left to their own devices. Only Wales have performed worse in the final quarter than England this year and they have failed to score a point in the last 20 minutes of four of their past five matches. Some of that is psychological. Some is physical, as Borthwick alluded to when commenting on their fitness levels.
But an inability to execute basic skills under pressure is primarily a talent issue. All the talk of England being denied by “fine margins” is a fallacy. Fine margins are precisely what decide Test matches and this is where England have been found wanting, whether that is missing a crucial dropped-goal attempt against New Zealand or coming away with no points from five line-outs in and around the Springbok 22.
A common theme of England’s run of narrow defeats dating back to the World Cup semi-final against the Springboks has been the lack of impact from the bench. If South Africa have the bomb squad, England have the bum squad.
Whatever momentum England had in the final quarter against South Africa was killed by Luke Cowan-Dickie’s dummy throw and Harry Randall’s knock-on at the base. Nick Isiekwe and Alex Dombrandt are fine Premiership performers but at international level are decidedly “meh”. Again this points to a lack of depth.
Aside from Smith, the only England players who have really elevated their standing this autumn have been the injured pair of Mitchell and Ollie Chessum. England have desperately missed Mitchell’s game-management from scrum-half and the mongrel qualities provided by Chessum, but let us not pretend that England are only two pieces from completing a jigsaw.
Admitting that England are average is not the same thing as accepting it. The RFU needs to set up the equivalent of a truth and reconciliation commission to examine why England are failing to consistently produce world-class talent. Is that genetic, cultural or something else entirely?
Sometimes players such as Ellis Genge and Ben Earl flirt with such a status only to plateau and regress. Earl’s work rate is staggering. Across the three matches he has a combined total of tackles and carries of 90, by far the most in the team, but his defining contributions have been a no-arms tackle on New Zealand second row Tupou Vaa’i and a missed tackle on Springbok centre Damian de Allende. Both proved match-defining moments.
The Premiership is a fantastic product as a spectacle but is it the right vehicle for honing and refining Test talent? The explosion in points being scored is fabulous for spectators, but it provides a false magnifying glass when assessing Test potential.
When you see players such as Ollie Lawrence carving it up for Bath, it is easy to think that will translate to international level. And then he gets repeatedly smashed running into the brick wall that is De Allende and Jesse Kriel in the South Africa midfield.
Unfortunately the 30-day return policy on the Professional Game Partnership that the RFU signed with Premiership Rugby in September has expired, so other solutions must be found. Previously I have opposed the RFU lifting its ban on selecting overseas players, believing it would further damage the Premiership and reduce the training time available to the England coaching staff.
However, I am now coming around to the view that if the Premiership is not serving its primary purpose – from an RFU perspective – then why should it maintain a policy that reduces their talent pool. Certainly the Top 14’s intensity is a lot closer to Test rugby than the Premiership and has helped to elevate Jack Willis’s game to another level.
At Wasps, Willis was primarily a jackaller but the flanker has developed an all-court game, improving his ball-carrying in particular while playing alongside Antoine Dupont and company. Kyle Sinckler’s scrummaging has gone to another level since moving to Toulon.
Arguably the most pivotal decision of Rassie Erasmus’s reign as Springboks coach was to lift the ban on selecting overseas players in 2018. This led to a stampede of players heading to Europe and Japan. In spite of gloomy pronouncements, they duly won the next two World Cups.
This is not to say scrapping the overseas rule would act as a silver bullet, but England are nowhere near good enough to maintain a protectionist policy. They are a bang average team. The sooner that is accepted, the sooner solutions can be found.
