The lay preacher was out working the Whitton Road before kick-off on Saturday afternoon, a battered megaphone in one hand and his tattered copy of the bible in the other. It has been a while since he has been seen around Twickenham, but he used to be a regular here on game days.
He must have come back to the old patch thinking that after that last half against Scotland at Murrayfield the England fans could use the good news. “We have faith, we have faith, we have faith,” he barked. “We have faith today.” The lads in the flat caps and wax jackets queueing at the pasty stall over the road did not look too convinced.
It had been the best part of 50 years since Ireland started a match here as such heavy favourites. When they came here in 1976 they had already peeled off four wins in this fixture in four years, and England had gone on to finish flat last in the championship every time.
Which was not so very different to this time. Ireland had won the past four matches against England 32-18, 32-15, 29-16 and 29-10. England had not even got within a couple of scores of them.
In all honesty, it was the least of Ireland’s accomplishments. They were on a run of 11 wins in the Six Nations and in the past five weeks they had beaten France by 21, Italy by 36 and Wales by 24. The last team to put together a run of three 20-point victories like that in the Six Nations was the England team that went on to win the World Cup in 2003. And the 2024 lot? Well, they had just about beaten Italy and Wales.
So, yes, faith was about all the England fans had left to work with. Five minutes in they were rewarded for it at last. George Furbank gathered a kick deep in his own half and set off on a diagonal run across the field, the ball was worked quickly across to Tommy Freeman, who bounced off Calvin Nash.
It was one of those collisions that seems to crack the entire match open, as if the shockwaves have knocked everyone backwards. Ireland were reeling and Ollie Lawrence was already barrelling down the wing past Jack Crowley. Lawrence shot off towards the corner like a popped cork, and stooped to slap the ball down.
Twickenham erupted. It has been a long time since the place sounded quite so loud, but then it has been a long time since England have played quite so well as they did in the opening minutes. The only problem with it all was that when the half was over, they were four points down.
Ireland barely made it into England’s 22, but they did not need to because they were able to pick off four penalties instead. Which was enough to give them a toehold. It was a testament to their composure that they were able to emerge from the squall with a lead, given how they were buffeted around the pitch. They needed a little luck to do it too.
Lawrence nearly had a second when he chipped ahead and gathered in the rebound after the ball ricocheted off Freeman as he grappled for it with Ciarán Frawley. It was struck off for a knock-on. Even so, it was England’s best half since they drew with New Zealand here in the autumn of 2022.
Their best until the one that followed it, anyway. Because as good as England were in the first 40 minutes, they were better in the second. They wore a couple of haymakers in it, when James Lowe scored once in the 43rd minute and again in the 72nd.
England came back harder. Their second followed right after Ireland’s first, when Furbank finished off a move set up by a couple of bullocking runs by Maro Itoje and Sam Underhill. When Ben Earl scored their third 15 minutes later, something very strange indeed happened. Twickenham started to thrum and rattle and bounce, the seats were vibrating, the rafters wobbling, the fixtures swinging, as tens of thousands of England fans leapt up and down in celebration.
England were working. It felt like you could finally see what Steve Borthwick has been building during all those training sessions at Pennyhill Park. Their pack played with an appetite that made you wonder whether Borthwick had starved them of meat all week. Ollie Chessum, on the blindside flank, seemed to be making every other tackle, in front of him George Martin was utterly formidable. Ben Earl, man of the match, was a human wrecking ball, and Maro Itoje and Ellis Genge were playing, again, like the men you remembered from the good old days before they had got used to losing. You could go on like this through the entire 23.
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Behind them, Lawrence, Freeman, Furbank, Immanuel Feyi-Waboso were all superb, so were Danny Care and Marcus Smith when they came on from the bench.
And when it was all over, the people were pouring out into the streets, full of spirit and cheer and laughter, and all the talk was about what a good game it had been, and how well England had played, the preacher was nowhere to be seen. He had packed up, and gone off into the night, presumably to some place where the people needed him more.
