Regardless of what happens on Saturday, it will not diminish the wretched nature of England’s Six Nations campaign. Each of the past two championships have ended on promising notes only for the team to disappear back into the abyss when they have next assembled. Seven games into the season and England’s gameplan is no nearer to becoming even remotely clear, let alone working.
Ashton: The Guinness Premiership’s form winger
They have nothing to lose in this game, they are almost certain to finish third in the Championship, their stock with their supporters can barely sink any lower and everybody expects them to get soundly beaten by a French team who have been head and shoulders above their rivals these past weeks. But England have very little to gain either because even a party-pooping performance in Paris will not erase the memories of what an utter chore it has been watching England making what is essentially a simple game look akin to explaining the theory of relativity to John Terry.
But don’t expect Martin Johnson to use this as an opportunity to experiment. That is not a word he includes in his vocabulary. In a tough international environment when winning the next game should be everything, this is not necessarily a bad thing. Continuity is desirable but not when it flies in the face of the evidence which is plainly obvious to anyone. There’s a fine line between stubbornness and plain pig-headedness and I’m afraid Johnno has been flirting dangerously with it for some time now. I fear he will charge headlong over it at selection this week.
The England camp are utterly delusional if they believe all the dull, rehearsed platitudes they have been disdainfully trotting out to their patient and long-suffering public over the past 2 months. It is vaguely insulting to the public to claim that there are ‘plenty of positives’ from every weak effort, as if the English rugby supporter knows so little about rugby that he will disregard the evidence of his own eyes if he is told that what he saw was actually not a directionless dirge.
After Saturday’s effort, Martin Johnson said, “The perception that the team is shackled and inhibited is wrong. We tried to do the right thing most of the time against Scotland but the mistakes killed us.” It looked to this observer as though it was the complete opposite. The lack of ambition and conviction, the total fear of making any mistakes was the problem. From the outside it looks as though the players are fearful that if they try something exciting and it goes wrong they will be dropped. Better not to try anything at all then because evidence suggests that is a surefire way of securing your selection for the next game. Johnno’s comments will have only served to make the players even more fearful of trying anything. It does not bode well for Saturday
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England have taken the conservative approach of low risk, low reward one step further to no risk, no reward. Nobody has stood out as having shockers, but nobody has really stood out in any way at all. Which brings us round to selection for this weekend. Nobody expects that Johnson will have a sudden epiphany and let his team loose. There will be tinkering at best. Ben Foden must play. He was England’s only attacking bright spark on Saturday and has been the best attacking player in England all season. He should have been there for at least the past 2 games.
Danny Care should still retain his place but it would be good to see Ben Youngs get a run in his main position. If Wilkinson is fit he is likely to start, with Flood as standby although Shane Geraghty would be a far more progressive option. He is another player with bags of talent who must be given his head soon. Chris Ashton must be in the frame to come in for Ugo Monye – he is, along with the perennially overlooked James Simpson-Daniel, the form winger in the country.
There are also injury doubts over Steve Borthwick which could open the way for Simon Shaw to return but it would also have been pleasing to see Courtney Lawes, who has been inexplicably released from the squad, given a chance to build on his undoubted ability. Rumour has it that Louis Deacon has been playing the past few games although it is hard to find video evidence of this. England badly need some dynamism in their pack and Lawes could be the man to provide this. As a wildcard, Tom Croft is back playing for Leicester and could be an option.
But what England need most is some shape and direction, a rallying point around whom they can base their game and that is why, unfashionable though it may be, I would support a recall for Mike Tindall for the rather ineffectual Mathew Tait. England need someone like Tindall in the wider channels, a physical specimen who can aggressively cross the gain line and provide some much needed shape as opposed to the current approach of shifting the ball rather slowly up and down the line waiting for someone else to do something inspirational or, more likely, knock it on or get turned over. They have rarely got behind the defence, as can be seen by the paucity of the line break and opposition missed tackle stats.
The inclusion of Tindall will allow those around him to play and create considerably more space for the wide men. It will keep the defence honest. It would not be purely a measure to combat Matthieu Bastereaud, although it would have that benefit. Given how hard England have found it to break down Scotland and Italy, they need to change something if they are to have any joy against the best defence in the championship.
So, in the certain knowledge that the final product will look nothing like this, my England XV to play France would be:
15. Ben Foden
14. Mark Cueto
13. Mike Tindall
12. Riki Flutey
11. Chris Ashton
10. Shane Geraghty
9. Danny Care
1. Tim Payne (for wont of any alternatives)
2. Dylan Hartley
3. Dan Cole
4. Courtney Lawes / Simon Shaw
5. Tom Croft
6. James Haskell
7. Lewis Moody
8. Nick Easter
What are your thoughts?
Bang on with the blog but disagree with your team on two counts, Geraghty and Croft.
I think Flood has been waiting in the wings long enough and should be given a full game rather than the 10 minutes here or there he currently gets (admittedly he got longer against Scotland). I am a massive fan of Geraghty and do believe he is a 10 rather than a 12 but I think it is wrong to leap frog Flood on this occasion.
Croft is an immense player at his best, but I fear a) that England will kill off that like every other decent player we have and b) It would be a case of rushing him back into the set up, we have rushed back Delon Armitage and Riki Flutey and neither have set the world alight by any stretch of the imagination. I would definitely have Lawes in there and as MJ seems determined to ignore Kennedy would pair him with Shaw, although it would more likely be with Dynamic Deacon.
Otherwise, bang on with everything; I find the outright lying from the England camp about England’s performances patronising and the sooner they realise they are losing/have lost the public the better as this is the only way we will see change.
Agree with most of what you say, but not all.
For a start, Payne could be swapped for any other prop in the country under the age of 30, and I do mean any. It wouldn’t make a blind bit of difference to the scrum and could only improve the loose (assuming the replacement doesn’t spend the whole game sleeping) but would give the other chap a chance to improve.
The choice between Geraghty or Flood is really one of preferences. Do you want the slightly more dynamic guy, or the guy who’s been waiting patiently for his chance. You pay your money…
The lump that is Tindall in the midfield would not, in itself, be a bad thing, but he’s dropping Tait who was (on paper) by far the most elusive runner on the starting sheet against Scotland, though he had as much chance to show it during the match as I did a few weeks ago when knocked out by the knee of one of my team mates 40secs into a game. Johnson seems to calculate that he can only have so much élan in one starting line-up. Once Foden was in, Tait was out.
The second row would be a little light with both Croft and Lawes, so I’d say Shaw and Lawes. Anyone but ‘Bumblebee’ Borthwick (he seems to fly at the lineout but no-one knows why) or ‘Dark-matter’ Deacon.
Otherwise I totally agree with the thrust of this article. Especially the bit about lying. In their post-match comments Johnson and Borthwick are beginning to be reminiscent of those people who go on TV asking for someone to help find the killer of a loved one, when all along it was they who did the killing.
Just want to know what the hell has happened to Flutey – Mr anonymous this six nations. MJ was a great captain but he is out of his depth now. I hope the boys don’t get a severe pasting in Paris but a loss may be good thing all round.