Suddenly England have one game to get it right before Stuart Lancaster tells the world the names of the 31 chosen to win the World Cup on home soil. After next Saturday in Paris the only game left before the tournament opens is Ireland at Twickenham and by then the big decision will have been made because, as often as not, it’s not just the frontline players who shape a World Cup, but the five or six in the second rank.
And for 50 minutes on Saturday I was quite happy. Unusually for England, they were playing away from their perceived strength, the pack, and it was working. There were ball players all over the place, runners so dangerous they were pulling the French defence out of shape and a young decision-maker having a field day.
Henry Slade’s vision to spot Brice Dulin out of position and his decision to call the play to himself were as good as the fast hands which shipped the ball on to Anthony Watson and the winger’s even faster feet which first stood up the late-arriving French wing and then left him for dead.
A handful of moves later it got even better as Slade slid into the role of first receiver, Sam Burgess was the simple link and off-load to Owen Farrell running around, Jonny May scared the French midfield witless, Alex Goode stood off to stop any French drift and Watson was pressing the accelerator, stepping in then out and going over in the corner.
England were nine points up with less than 20 minutes gone. And then the French decided that was not how they wanted to play.
They had picked a pack which might have five or more in the eight that will start their World Cup and four from the core that played England at the end of the Six Nations. By French standards it was a settled front five unit. With Louis Picamoles slimmed down and, in the absence of Thierry Dusautoir, the captain, Fulgence Ouedraogo and Yannick Nyanga everywhere and playing like they once did, they took it to Lancaster’s main weapon.
The pack is England’s go-to option. The pack dominates the set pieces, the fly-half kicks for position and pressure produces points. But this was not England’s first-choice pack and on the night we got some idea of what life at the World Cup will be like without the first-choice hooker, Dylan Hartley.
OK, England will have Dan Cole and Joe Marler in the front row, with Courtney Lawes and Joe Launchbury in the engine room. But with Hartley missing there will a massive reliance on Tom Youngs, a hooker at his best coming off the bench to make an impact, to punch holes or make breaks of which all but a few No2s can only dream. He isn’t the most obvious Test starter unless he brushes up his throwing into the line-out.
Without Hartley, the Youngs role falls to Rob Webber, a steady Eddie if you like or, currently, in third spot for the No2 shirt Luke Cowan-Dickie, a perfectly fine club hooker, but a young man who spent 25 minutes of Saturday night learning on the job.
It is often said that while guys rarely cement World Cup berths in warm-ups , the often lose them and Jamie George’s prospects looked a whole lot better by 10pm on Saturday night.
That is not unfair to Cowan-Dickie, who might have a considerable Test future. What is unfair is that he should be expected to learn the demands of Test rugby so late in the day. Ditto Slade. Play him and you are in danger of an overabundance of playmakers – George Ford, Jamie Joseph, Goode, Farrell; who ever thought that might be said of Lancaster’s England? – and not enough ball carriers.
On Saturday Slade and Burgess, who did himself absolutely no harm while shaking a few French teeth lose, cleverly interchanged around the set piece. While things were going well it gave England options left and right and France a dose of the jitters. When they weren’t, it looked like every man for himself.
Mako Vunipola had worked himself to a frazzle, both in the scrum and running around in the loose and had nothing left when he departed in the 62nd minute. The best that can be said for Ben Morgan is that he survived 40 minutes, which, after eight months out, is something in itself considering, so word has it, that he has only been doing contact for a fortnight. But Calum Clark and James Haskell, when he got on, looked pretty ordinary.
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