Red Roses Autumn Series and WXV1

The Red Roses have a challenging schedule this autumn:

7 Sept	England v France	Kingsholm	3.30pm BST
14 Sept	England v New Zealand	Allianz	2.30pm BST
29 Sept	USA v England	BC Place, Vancouver	8.30pm BST
6 Oct	New Zealand v England	Langley Event Centre, Langley	9.00pm BST
12/13 Oct	Canada v England	BC Place, Vancouver	3.00am BST

Teams are up for England v France. Kabeya and Jones are injured - but look at that bench:

England: Kildunne; Dow, Rowland, Heard, Breach; Aitchison, Hunt; Botterman, Cokayne, Muir, Aldcroft, Talling, Feaunati, M Packer, Matthews.

Replacements: Atkin-Davies, Carson, Bern, Campion, Cleall, L Packer, Harrison, Scarratt.

France: Jacquet; Banet, Konde, M Menager, Boulard; Tuy, Chambon; Brosseau, Sochat, Khalfaoui, M Feleu (capt), Fall, Escudero, Gros, R Menager.

Replacements: Bigot, Mwayembe, Bernadou, Ikahehegi, Okemba, T Feleu, Bourdon Sansus, Vernier.

That back row is frightening. And the bench is ridiculous. Campion deserves her spot. And good to see Poppy again. And when you bear in mind someone like Abbie Ward has not been selected, this is still a statement of intent.

If France struggle early, it could be a long game. Hopefully one without cards...

Great to see Sarah Bern back, always my favourite prop. Reminds me (in the way she plays) of a young Marler when he had the speed to out pace backs

A very strong England line up there. Bern as WPI says an awesome player, her loose play remarkable. Rowland starts with Scarrat bench.
Poppy Cleall was at one time Red Roses best forward but she her form took a big dip plus injury/ban so hopefully back to her best as she is a destructive 8.

WELL-PAST-IT wrote:Great to see Sarah Bern back, always my favourite prop. Reminds me (in the way she plays) of a young Marler when he had the speed to out pace backs

One of Ms Poorfour Maj's favourites as well. We met her after the RWC Final in 2017 and again after the 2021 6N game v Wales. She had lots of time for the fans. It was also noticeable how much her conditioning had changed her body shape - in '17 she was known as the Box on Legs, but by '21 her upper body was a pronounced inverted triangle. At her best, probably the most complete player in the world game, though she's got a fight on her hands to get the shirt back from Muir.

Initial articles saying kick off tomorrow was 1530 BST, now showing as 14:30 BST.
Think 1430 is the correct time.

Decent game, England looked a bit rusty at first understandably but soon got to grips. France looked to attack at every opportunity but errors let them down. Result not in doubt after 20 mins but they kept at it.
Atichson, Heard, Botterman all good games but Feaunati was player of match for me.
Kicking from tee much improved by Atchison which was good.

It was a very rusty England today. A classic example of the forwards doing all the work and the backs effing it up - I lost count of the passes to no-one, and there were at least two interceptions. One beautiful move in the first half with deft handling between about half the pack got passed into touch as soon as a back got involved.

From the stands it looked as if the ref was somewhat generous to France in not requiring them to roll away before the jackal went in, but France’s breakdown work was much better than England’s for most of the game.

Still, that England could make as many mistakes as they did and still come out with a decisive victory speaks volumes about how good they are. They will need a better performance to win agains the Black Ferns next week, though.

One aspect of the game I thought was decisive was the difference in ruck speed once Mo Hunt went off. Lucy Packer took her try well, but she was almost as slow as Ben Youngs getting the ball away. She needs to have much quicker decision making. I would really like Ella Wyrwas to get some game time but I can't see that happening against the Black Ferns due to experience, unless there's an injury.

The front rows played well apart from the France pushover try. I wondered about the legality of that scrum given the lack of previous issues and no further problems either.

As stated above, the backs seemed to be trying too hard, with tip passes to ground or slightly behind, and passes directly to the opposition which allowed the French to counter. I thought Maddie Feaunati played well, although her leg injury looks a possible issue. Hope she's ok for next week. The French DEFINITELY targeted Ellie Kildunne, with some of the challenges marginal, especially the early one where the TMO didn't even look at it. It was clearly "accidental, ref". My 4 players of the match were Maddie, Maud Muir, Hannah Botterman and Jess Breach, who took her tries really well, showing excellent footwork and speed. I reckon the pack and lineout will be significantly bolstered by Abbie Ward and Rosie Galligan at 5 and 19 next week, otherwise I doubt there'll be too many changes.

After the match it was good to see the players doing their usual rounds with the fans wanting selfies, and my friend and I got to meet Zoe Harrison (again), Abby Dow (who is just as wonderful as she appears in interviews), Simi Pam (non-playing squad Loosehead and Bristol Bear - who's SO friendly!), Amy Cokayne who signed my mate's cap, Coach Sarah Hunter, and Helena Rowland (who was also happy to have a selfie with us). We weren't so lucky with Mo Hunt who was desperate for a shower and Emily Scarratt, who was doing family stuff. Still, a really good day out!

Be interesting to see where England stand by playing NZ who will definitely be looking for revenge from WXV. Biggest stat though is RWC, NZ have beaten Red Roses in 5 finals. That has to change next year and everything is geared towards that.

Mitchell has them playing way more adventerously, offloads etc which showed in some of intercepts(!). One or two were really poor though, I can't understand how Aitchison I think it was couldn't see the French player just standing there. Anyway, now is time to try things and work on moves and plays.

Red card aside, I did think last final that NZ were the more attacking team in backline and Mitchell is addressing that and making England play more and not purely rely on forward power. England has the backline to trouble any team and if they can link everything up they can win RWC.

mountain man wrote:Be interesting to see where England stand by playing NZ who will definitely be looking for revenge from WXV. Biggest stat though is RWC, NZ have beaten Red Roses in 5 finals. That has to change next year and everything is geared towards that.

Having watched the last three England v NZ finals (and attended two), there's been a definite progression.

In 2010, it always felt like the Ferns had enough to overwhelm the Roses - it was just a question of when they'd overpower them.

In 2017, England built up a decent first half lead and at half time it felt like a question of whether they'd done enough with the chances they had (and a feeling that they needed to have converted at least one more to have a defensible lead).

In 2021, England were clearly the better side until the RC (which was the correct decision), but went into their shells and reverted to relying on forward dominance, even though their best passages of play post RC were when they tried the expansive style again. They might still have won had some of the other refereeing decisions gone their way (the NZ YC met the criteria for a red as far as I could see, and there were some offences missed in the final lineout), and they still had a chance to win at the end (though I wasn't hpeful - Abby Ward was clearly out on her feet in the last couple of minutes).

As you say, everything from here on in is geared towards winning, and I wonder if Mitchell is deliberately trying to create adverse conditions so that the team are more used to playing under them. In the last 6N they had an unusual number of YCs - but were still dominant - and on Saturday it looked a bit as if they might have been overtraining in the run up to the game.

As an aside, an unexpected bonus for being in the stadium was seeing Dave and Abby Ward and their daughter in the stands.

Training squad for this weekend:

Zoe Aldcroft, Lark Atkin-Davies, Sarah Bern, Hannah Botterman, Georgia Brock, Delaney Burns, Mackenzie Carson, Poppy Cleall, Kelsey Clifford, Amy Cokayne, Maddie Feaunati, Rosie Galligan, Lilli Ives Campion, Alex Matthews, Maud Muir, Marlie Packer, Connie Powell, Morwenna Talling, Abbie Ward

Holly Aitchison, Jess Breach, Katie Buchanan, Abby Dow, Zoe Harrison, Tatyana Heard, Mo Hunt, Ellie Kildunne, Sarah McKenna, Phoebe Murray, Lucy Packer, Helena Rowland, Emily Scarratt, Emma Sing, Bo Westcombe-Evans, Ella Wyrwas

Good to see Feaunati included - she played well on Saturday but there were concerns that she was injured when she came off.

To the extent that John Mitchell will rejig the matchday squad, where there are changes I would expect it to be a case of bringing in more experience rather than trying new players against the Black Ferns. I thought vs Les Bleues the communication between the backline was very rusty, and the most obvious change to improve that would be to bring Scarratt back in at 13. However, he seems to see her future primarily as a 12, and it would be harsh to replace Heard, who played well.

The forwards were much better form on Saturday, and there are at least two complete international class packs in the 19 players selected. There's speculation that Abbie Ward will come back into the squad this week, but there are so many top class options that it's hard to worry about it.

Aitchison was at fault for at least one intercept, Heard played well so should keep place as should Rowland. Aitchison had a good overall game though but be good if Harrison got some time in 2nd half.

mountain man wrote:Aitchison was at fault for at least one intercept, Heard played well so should keep place as should Rowland. Aitchison had a good overall game though but be good if Harrison got some time in 2nd half.

Kildunne threw an intercept too, and I lost count of the number of passes that went to no-one. Ms Poorfour Maj (a forward to her core) was fuming at the lovely move around half time where the forwards managed a flowing series of passes that had France on the ropes only for Rowland (IIRC) to step in and throw the ball behind Dow and into touch.

I know the backs are trying to be more expansive in their play, but it was a bit worrying how poor the handling was, even for a first game back. Fingers crossed that they have improved with practice.

Team's up...

15. Kildunne
14. Dow
13. Scarratt
12. Heard
11. Breach
10. Aitchison
9. Hunt
1. Carson
2. Atkin-Davies
3. Bern
4. Aldcroft
5. Ward
6. Feaunati
7. Packer
8. Matthews

16. Cokayne; 17. Botterman; 18. Muir; 19. Talling; 20. Brock; 21. Packer; 22. Harrison; 23. Rowland

As predicted, Scaz returns to the backline, which should help with distribution. A surprising amount of change in the pack given how well they went last time out, with half of the starting 8 rotating to the bench, all from the front five. Again, it speaks to the strength in depth that a change on that scale won't raise too many eyebrows - though I think this is the first time in a long while that Botterman hasn't started a major test.

Far too many missed tackles already by England, NZ really up for this.

And yet ultimately a comfortable win for the Red Roses. New Zealand had the edge in quite a few aspects of the game, especially the breakdown and scrum, but England still had enough to dominate until they started to tire.

This is a team that can win against the best available opposition while still playing some way below their best, which is pretty scary

Scoreline flattered England, deserved winners but too many errors. Aitchison pretty woeful at tackling, and kicking penalty out was criminal. OK only a warm up but NZ will improve significantly for RWC, Eng need to as well.

Dow superb, couple of brilliant breaks and a try. She tackles like a back row and jackels. Replacement front row made a difference as did Rowland for Scarratt who was pretty average.

Leti-I'iga was sensational on wing for NZ, a threat every time had ball and broke a lot of tackles. See my point above!

A decent win but plenty to work on.

I thought Aitchison was a liability yesterday. Pass to touch, kicks straight out, messing up the conversion by not paying attention to the shot clock and letting dangerous balls bounce before collecting them. I know every player has an off day, but she's been poor for two straight games now. Zoe Harrison deserves another shot at 10 in my opinion.

Abbie Ward, Zoe Aldcroft (yellow aside) and Alex Matthews were immense yesterday, as was Abby Dow. The 2 NZ wingers and their 13 (Brunt?) were fantastic.

And the atmosphere at Twickenham (I refuse to call it the Allianz even though I understand the reasoning) was really good.

mountain man wrote:Scoreline flattered England, deserved winners but too many errors. Aitchison pretty woeful at tackling, and kicking penalty out was criminal. OK only a warm up but NZ will improve significantly for RWC, Eng need to as well.

Dow superb, couple of brilliant breaks and a try. She tackles like a back row and jackels. Replacement front row made a difference as did Rowland for Scarratt who was pretty average.

Leti-I'iga was sensational on wing for NZ, a threat every time had ball and broke a lot of tackles. See my point above!

A decent win but plenty to work on.

It seems you and I interpreted the game very differently. I thought the score line flattered the Ferns; one of their scores was well-worked (albeit they needed a couple of penalties to get started) but the second one came from a lucky bounce. The Roses could and should have scored more.

New Zealand made mistakes and will improve significantly for RWC25, but I thought they were a lot closer to their peak than England in terms of basic proficiency and error count.

England also made a lot of poor passes (and poor choices about when to pass), their scrum looked vulnerable on occasion and they were too slow at the breakdown on several occasions. All of those are things you’d expect to improve dramatically over the season. In particular, they were missing Kabeya at the breakdown - though Feaunati has been playing well enough that when they are all fit Mitchell may have a tough decision about whether Marlie Packer’s captaincy is enough to keep her in the squad.

And I don’t know what you were expecting from Scarratt, but I thought she had a very good game. She was one of the better distributors in the backline and made several incisive runs. Aside from the last blocked kick that led to their second try, I thought she contributed to a much improved performance compared to last week.

The point remains, though, that England are a team who have played well below their best for two weeks against two of the three teams immediately below them in the rankings, and won by two or more scores on each occasions. That’s a big gap for everyone else to bridge.

One thing I took away from the game was the difference in ball-handling abilities, and particularly passing. Virtually every pass from the Ferns was flat, fast and accurate, whereas the England players (and especially Aitchison) tended to throw a big looping pass when missing someone out. The difference in speed was huge. I reckon it's something that's been coached into the Ferns from an early age.

If the Red Roses can replicate the accuracy and speed of the passing shown by the Ferns, they will be fearsome.

Mr Bounce wrote:One thing I took away from the game was the difference in ball-handling abilities, and particularly passing. Virtually every pass from the Ferns was flat, fast and accurate, whereas the England players (and especially Aitchison) tended to throw a big looping pass when missing someone out. The difference in speed was huge. I reckon it's something that's been coached into the Ferns from an early age.

If the Red Roses can replicate the accuracy and speed of the passing shown by the Ferns, they will be fearsome.

I think they can do it; although they still made mistakes in the 6N, I recall the passing having much more zip.

I wonder if the Roses have "done a Walters" and went into these warm ups off the back of a heavy training load. Their performance had some similarities to the mens' in the RWC warm ups last year. It would be consistent with Mitch's philosophy of creating adversity so that the team are more used to grinding out a win when under the pump.

I fully expect that everything in the next 12 months will be geared towards RWC 2025, and Mitchell will be quite happy to risk losses in pursuit of it. I wouldn't even be surprised to see them play like they did at the weekend in their pool games so as to manage their taper towards the knockout phases, because unless they get a very unlucky draw they can afford to give themselves disadvantages in the pools in pursuit of being in better shape later.

Mr Bounce wrote:One thing I took away from the game was the difference in ball-handling abilities, and particularly passing. Virtually every pass from the Ferns was flat, fast and accurate, whereas the England players (and especially Aitchison) tended to throw a big looping pass when missing someone out. The difference in speed was huge. I reckon it's something that's been coached into the Ferns from an early age.

If the Red Roses can replicate the accuracy and speed of the passing shown by the Ferns, they will be fearsome.

I thought in the last RWC final red card aside, NZ backline play was better. Rather like their male counterparts they often seem more comfortable with ball handling and passing etc. Must be something coached into them from a young age as you say.

mountain man wrote:
I thought in the last RWC final red card aside, NZ backline play was better. Rather like their male counterparts they often seem more comfortable with ball handling and passing etc. Must be something coached into them from a young age as you say.

I've heard that opinion from several different directions, and I wonder if they were watching the same game that I did. Or at least, if they watched the first 20 minutes.

Before the red card, England were outplaying NZ in pretty much every dimension, including the back division - they scored two cracking tries from backs moves.  

After the red card, they reverted to a more forward oriented style of play for most of the game except for a short burst of more expansive play when the subs started to come on.

And the Ferns, while deserving of their win, scored nearly all their points by attacking down the channel where England had lost a player. They did that ruthlessly, but people overemphasise the finishes rather than the phase work on the other side of the pitch that left England without cover in place. The clever bit was forcing England to revert to their defensive structure and stopping them compensating for the missing player.

Handling skills are better in the SH, in part because of U18 rugby being played by weight grade rather than age grade. When all the kids are similar size, the incentive to try to dominate by size is lower and so there's more emphasis on handling. I think NZ has also had late specialisation for a lot longer than England - kids are encouraged to play multiple positions and only get steered to a particular role as they reach adulthood.

The RFU has been trying something similar with its county U16 programme - but went a bit too far in the first iteration. They have been selecting entirely on handling and team skills and forgot to tag whicb players were trained to play front row, with the result that a couple of counties were scrabbling around trying to put a tight five together from their squads.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/articles/clyz319dyd7o

Alex Matthews captains the Roses on Sunday. Nice to see that Mitchell is still having a look at and bringing new caps into the fold. I'm not specifically familiar with either Westcombe-Evans or Murray yet, but if they're good enough, I see Mitchell beginning the bones of the new Roses post-WC, which can only be a good thing.

Nice to see that some of the more "crucial" players such as Botterman, Hunt, Heard, Marlie Packer and Abby Dow are being rested too, and that Ella Wyrwas and Zoe Harrison are getting some game time. Looking forward to watching this on Sunday.

I hope Zoe Harrison has a good tournament, I'm not convinced Aitchison is best option at 10. Last few games some poor decisions and even worse passing when under pressure.

mountain man wrote:I hope Zoe Harrison has a good tournament, I'm not convinced Aitchison is best option at 10. Last few games some poor decisions and even worse passing when under pressure.

I don't understand why they have persevered with Aitchison. She was a converted centre parachuted into the role due to injuries. She's "ok" but like you mentioned, she's been poor under pressure. Harrison was fantastic in the previous World Cup and I hope she'll be given the chance to continue at 10.

Mr Bounce wrote:https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/articles/clyz319dyd7o

Alex Matthews captains the Roses on Sunday. Nice to see that Mitchell is still having a look at and bringing new caps into the fold. I'm not specifically familiar with either Westcombe-Evans or Murray yet, but if they're good enough, I see Mitchell beginning the bones of the new Roses post-WC, which can only be a good thing.

Nice to see that some of the more "crucial" players such as Botterman, Hunt, Heard, Marlie Packer and Abby Dow are being rested too, and that Ella Wyrwas and Zoe Harrison are getting some game time. Looking forward to watching this on Sunday.

It's 18 months away, but it's going to be interesting to see how (and how much) rebuilding the Red Roses need post RWC. Only 6 of the current squad will be over 30 at the end of the RWC, but only 9 of them will still be under 30 by the time we get to RWC 2029 - which suggests that there could well be a turnover of about half the squad in the next cycle.

How do the Roses do it? Handling was a bit off. Cohesion wasn't quite there in the face of a very physical USA. They had real problems dealing with the USA hard running USA no.12 etc.

And yet the score was 61-21,

Exceptional try from Kildunne. One almost as good from Breech late on. Very clinical when the chances were on and some very good kicking.

A mixed bag. Harrison's kicking,both from the tee and from hand was superb but there were far too many handling errors, forward passes and trying to do stuff that clearly wasn't on.

The mauls, once England's most feared weapon, appears to have been tamed. I feel that England were a bit arrogant here, expecting it to go their way, not fully understanding the new rules and not having a plan B.

Kildunne's try was exceptional, but there's a reason why my friend and I call her "No Pass". A couple of times she could have passed for a potential score. Other plusses were Bo W-E and Murray, both solid debuts, Morwenna Talling doing her thing, and the "3 playmakers" of Harrison, Aitchison and Rowland causing havoc late on.

I felt Lucy Packer was poor though. She waits too long at the base, knocked on a couple of times and was rolled over more than once. I would have got Ella Wyrwas on MUCH earlier in the game. Her tackle on the 10 on the line was good pressure though.

I foresee changes next time!

A thought that occurred to me this morning is that the Roses might be trying to build the kind of unstructured, multiple options at every play game that Eddie Jones tried to build with the men.

It seems consistent with their willingness to chuck the ball around and they don’t seem to be operating a clear pod system - a lot of their errors were coming several passes into a phase in an effort either to get around the defence or keep the play alive.

Eddie lost his job trying to build that system because it takes time to adapt and England were losing too many games trying to do so.

But the Red Roses are not a normal rugby team. They’ve demonstrated in their last three games that they can play with a high error rate and still win comfortably against their most challenging opposition. When their style of play works, they tend to score more often than not, and when it doesn’t, their defence is good enough to foil most attacks.

On the other side of the coin, even USA showed that the head start in professionalism is no longer enough. They were organised, physical, had a few weak spots in the set piece but were decently competitive for much of the game.

Mitchell spoke when he took the job about needing to harden the team to adversity but also to sustain the edge they had. I think by changing the game plan this way he might be trying to do both at once. It will be interesting to go into the next two games with that thought and see if it holds up.

Harrison superb at 10, way better game management passing and especially kicking from tee and out of hand
She has to start over Aitchison in key matches.
New caps played well, after a slightly slow start England excellent.

Watching the Ireland-NZ game, which is a cracker.

Some excellent work by the TMO for Ireland's third try, unpicking a very messy tackle area and correcting the ref on what she should be looking at ("Slow down Coxy, we need to check that there was actually a ruck...")

Watching the France v Canada game now. Some very dodgy officiating in the run up to opening try.

The try itself was fine, but it came from a French turnover being immediately turned back over because the Canadian tackler was allowed to lie on the wrong side, and a break that happened because a player in front of the ball blocked a tackle.

Compared to the standard of reffing in the other two games, it's a bit of a shocker.

I have two or three big issues with the Roses, who are the imaginary players they keep passing to. I lost count of the number of passes that just went to thin air, no one even close, never mind the ones that went over heads or at head level from only a couple of metres, not giving the catcher a chance.

The kick offs (receiving) were appalling, no calls for the ball, no protection for a potential catcher, no lifting of a catcher. I have seen school sides receive the ball in a more organised manner.

We were turned over far too many times by the USA pushing us off the ball at the breakdown, we under committed to securing the ball, often with only one or two players. the USA committed more, we got pushed off it. It happened at least 3 or 4 times.

However we did win big, so just how good can we be when we sort out the mistakes?

WELL-PAST-IT wrote:
However we did win big, so just how good can we be when we sort out the mistakes?

Well, quite.

Ireland and Canada played very well to bring down NZ and France... England have made a ton of mistakes across their three games but won by large margins against the same opponents.

Rugby matches are normally fairly closely matched and are won by the team that has the edge in a couple of areas; among top level teams, you tend to get a blowout score when one team is just a little bit better across a wide range of areas.

The Roses have a lot of work-ons, but their core game is clearly so strong that they can afford to make mistakes because their defence, setpiece and maul are good enough to compensate, and when their attacking play gets going, they score.

While they still have plenty of work-ons, I am increasingly of the view that Mitchell is confident enough in their core game that he is encouraging them to work on the more expansive game in competitive matches rather than constraining it to the training pitch.

England team to play New Zealand:

15. Ellie Kildunne (Harlequins, 46 caps)
14. Abby Dow (Trailfinders Women, 47 caps)
13. Helena Rowland (Loughborough Lightning, 32 caps)
12. Tatyana Heard (Gloucester-Hartpury, 24 caps)
11. Jess Breach (Saracens, 41 caps)
10. Holly Aitchison (Bristol Bears, 33 caps)
9. Natasha Hunt (Gloucester-Hartpury, 74 caps)
1. Hannah Botterman (Bristol Bears, 49 caps)
2. Amy Cokayne (Leicester Tigers, 77 caps)
3. Maud Muir (Gloucester-Hartpury, 33 caps)
4. Zoe Aldcroft (Gloucester-Hartpury, 56 caps)
5. Abbie Ward (Bristol Bears, 67 caps)
6. Morwenna Talling (Sale Sharks, 16 caps)
7. Marlie Packer (Saracens, 107 caps) – captain
8. Alex Matthews (Gloucester-Hartpury, 70 caps)

Replacements:
16. Lark Atkin-Davies (Bristol Bears, 60 caps)
17. Mackenzie Carson (Gloucester-Hartpury, 18 caps)
18. Sarah Bern (Bristol Bears, 64 caps)
19. Rosie Galligan (Saracens, 17 caps)
20. Maddie Feaunati (Exeter Chiefs, 8 caps)
21. Lucy Packer (Harlequins, 24 caps)
22. Zoe Harrison (Saracens, 52 caps)
23. Emily Scarratt (Loughborough Lightning, 114 caps)

The Roses make 10 changes to the team that beat the USA. Tough on some of the players from last week, but that’s a seriously impressive XXIII.

That back three picks itself. Great players, all 3 of them. Arguments could be made for changes across the field and on the bench, but it's still a mightily impressive line-up. It looks like the Roses might attack the lineout with effectively 4 jumpers in Ward, Aldcroft, Talling and Matthews.

Well done Hannah Botterman for making 50 caps at the age of 25.

Disappointed to see Aitchison starting at 10 given how well Harrison played but not really surprised. Mitchell giving squad game time etc.as a raft of changes.
Heard and Rowland in centre best options available given Meg Jones out.

Results overnight seem to have gone to form - France beat USA, though by a much smaller margin than England did, and Ireland went down to Canada.

We’ll see tonight whether the Ferns can raise their game, but I am beginning to wonder if Canada will be the most dangerous opponents come RWC 25. Their record since RWC 21 is that they have only lost to England and the Black Ferns, and they are on a 6 game winning streak that includes France (twice) and NZ.

mountain man wrote:Disappointed to see Aitchison starting at 10 given how well Harrison played but not really surprised. Mitchell giving squad game time etc.as a raft of changes.
Heard and Rowland in centre best options available given Meg Jones out.

Aitchison has made a few mistakes already in the first half. She's been disappointing. How many chances is she going to get??

Mr Bounce wrote:

mountain man wrote:Disappointed to see Aitchison starting at 10 given how well Harrison played but not really surprised. Mitchell giving squad game time etc.as a raft of changes.
Heard and Rowland in centre best options available given Meg Jones out.

Aitchison has made a few mistakes already in the first half. She's been disappointing. How many chances is she going to get??

I don’t think you can judge any member of this England side by how many mistakes they’ve made, because at the moment they are all making mistakes and I think it is because they are being encouraged to play on the edge.

That said, I would like to see Harrison given a chance to reclaim the shirt - but with the long list of wins, this is the kind of team where you have to wrest the shirt from the player in possession.

After a fairly nervy start, the Roses have taken pretty comprehensive control of the game.

A big advantage in the scrum is giving them the platform, and passing between the back division is starting to click. The threat that each of the back three offers is fixing the defence and the little 1-2 passes are proving very hard to defend.

I feel sorry for Tatiana Heard, though, who has mostly received hospital passes all day. England’s best attacks have generally come when the ball has gone past her.

Meanwhile, the bomb squad is on.

Didn't catch the first half, Thought Heard was mostly really good although the passing was getting increasingly erratic before she was replaced. But the hard running and hard tackling were very important.

Quite the performance overall. And that Kildunne tackle...

Cracking match to watch and NZ really took it to Eng first half but Eng too good. However, so many missed tackles by Eng which is not good enough. Sorry to harp on but Aitchison again culprit several times and again threw poor passes. Has to be Harrison now for big matches.

Back 3 of Eng superb, again. Dow though has it all, pace power and can smash in tackle and win turnovers.

Canada though will be a test, they can match England physically so at home will be looking to cause an upset. I think Eng though be too good.

Canada are definitely looking like they deserve the tag of #2 team in the world right now. I think they will pose a different challenge from the Ferns, but it's hard to imagine them being able to nullify all the ways England can attack.

NZ found some ways to challenge England - mostly by using breakdown dominance to come through the middle of the ruck. But the cover defending from England was enough, and their attacking ability finally started to click.

The statistics pages made interesting reading - NZ had parity or an edge in most areas bar the scrum and red zone efficiency, but still couldn't get enough points on the board to threaten England's lead. The consolation try at the end made the scoreboard more flattering to them than it really was.

Poorfour wrote:Canada are definitely looking like they deserve the tag of #2 team in the world right now. I think they will pose a different challenge from the Ferns, but it's hard to imagine them being able to nullify all the ways England can attack.

NZ found some ways to challenge England - mostly by using breakdown dominance to come through the middle of the ruck. But the cover defending from England was enough, and their attacking ability finally started to click.

The statistics pages made interesting reading - NZ had parity or an edge in most areas bar the scrum and red zone efficiency, but still couldn't get enough points on the board to threaten England's lead. The consolation try at the end made the scoreboard more flattering to them than it really was.

The stats are in part shaped by NZ having the ball in the England 22 and, although they scored too often to be ideal it took them time to manufacture the points. England tended to score quickly. Ultimately only one set of statistics are important and England was well ahead on those.

Slightly off topic but regarding women's Rugby: Has anyone gone and watched the Leicester women's Rugby team live? I ask because a women from my Rugby club here in New Jersey is playing for the Leicester women. Further, she plays for the US national team and actually captained the US team against Japan a couple of months ago. We are hyper proud of our Tess Fuery. So wondering if anyone has seen her play. She plays in the back three.

doctor_grey wrote:Slightly off topic but regarding women's Rugby:  Has anyone gone and watched the Leicester women's Rugby team live?  I ask because a women from my Rugby club here in New Jersey is playing for the Leicester women.  Further, she plays for the US national team and actually captained the US team against Japan a couple of months ago.  We are hyper proud of our Tess Fuery.  So wondering if anyone has seen her play.  She plays in the back three.  

You've mentioned her here before, I think. I've not seen her play yet, but Big Game 16 will see Leicester Women play Quins Women on 28 Dec at 3pm UK time, so I will see her live then.