Navidi tells Wales to build momentum towards historic clash with England

an often laboured stop-start affair, a much-changed Wales team ultimately got the job done.

Tries by wing Josh Adams and centre Owen Watkin, plus stand-off Dan Biggar’s accurate goalkicking, saw Wales post an 11th successive victory stretching back to last season’s tournament.

While England will pose an altogether tougher examination – they have beaten Wales five times on the bounce in Six Nations action – Navidi and company know they can make history and stay on a Grand Slam course by winning at the Principality Stadium.

“The England game is going to get hyped up a lot but we need to just focus on ourselves,” the Wales No 8 said.

“We were disappointed with the performance [against Italy], but a win is a win.

“We know that we have got a lot of things to work on to 2 Wales’ flanker Josh Navidi tackles Italy’s full-back Jayden Hayward in Rome on Saturday. be prepared for England. We know where we are at, and now we’ve got a big couple of weeks to build into the England game. We need to improve and keep the momentum going.”

Wales head coach Warren Gatland made ten changes for the Stadio Olimpico encounter, handing Six Nations debuts to Leicester wing Jonah Holmes and Wasps flanker Thomas Young, while scrumhalf Aled Davies and back-row forward Aaron Wainwright made first Six Nations starts.

And he has no doubt it was the right selection path to follow, having taken 31 players on last week’s training camp in Nice at the start of World Cup year.

Gatland said: “For us, there is a bigger picture that we were looking at for the first two games [against France and Italy].

“That was having the opportunity to get away for a week with a squad of 31 and replicating what might happen at the World Cup. If this was a normal year, on reflection, maybe we wouldn’t have made so many changes, but we wanted to give everyone in the 31 an opportunity to be involved in the first two games.”

Gatland will hope to have a full selection hand available against England when Wales target breaking the record of 11 victories set between 1907 and 1910. “We didn’t speak about the record at all this week, but we will probably talk about it before England,” Gatland added. “There will definitely be no lack of motivation.”