All Blacks will take notice after England edge a Cardiff classic
WHAT a fabulous game of rugby — the Six Nations Championship at its very best — and I can guarantee you even Steven Hansen and his All Blacks will have clocked that belter in Cardiff last night.
I’m beginning to think the 2017 British & Irish Lions could be a very special team indeed.
What England demonstrated yet again is that if you don’t put them away when you are on top, they will bite back with interest.
Last summer in Australia, they won Tests that they could and should have lost. Last week at Twickenham they should have lost to France and again in Cardiff there were periods when Wales seemed to be bossing the game.
The Welsh will be kicking themselves for not burying the ball into touch when they had the chance with three minutes left.
George Ford ran it back and Elliot Daly did the rest with his try.
England earned the victory. They defended superbly for long periods and they turned up determined to ‘play’ which is not always easy to do in Cardiff. They were positive at all times, as were Wales, and the result was a game that crackled from start to finish. There were so many performances to enjoy. Top of that list was a superb man-ofthe-match performance from Joe Launchbury, who is well and truly back to where he was before that serious neck injury.
He was perpetual motion for 80 minutes — tackling, carrying, winning line-outs. He was a machine — as were Sam Warburton and Justin Tipuric, who were exceptional in tandem again. To
play that well and be on the losing side must be truly gutting.
Wales won the turnover duel 8-1 and much of that was down to them. As a unit, the Wales back row won their battle with the England counterparts — Paul Moriarty was a force of nature before he went off — but the English breakaways did a lot of good things individually.
Nathan Hughes ran powerfully, Maro Itoje was immense in the close quarters and James Haskell, who came on for Jack Clifford, gave England energy when they needed it late on.
Jack Nowell was rock solid in defence and did wonders not to cough the ball up or concede a try in that Dan Biggar breakout in the first half, and Daly showed his defensive qualities when he raced back after Biggar’s interception in the second half.
England’s first-half try was deserved, well-worked and showed great patience going through 26 phases.
After that, though, they came under the cosh. It is often the big defensive shifts which decide the outcome in such games. England did well to concede just the one try before the break.
There are often key moments in a game and one came during that period when Alun Wyn Jones chose not to go for goal and opted for a scrum instead.
England turned that scrum over but, in my opinion, it was still the right call because it was based on emotion and keeping the momentum. It stoked Welsh fires further and ultimately, I would argue, it resulted in that glorious score for Liam Williams.
England didn’t clear the ball that well from the penalty they won turning over the scrum, Wales kept up the pressure and the play that Rhys Webb and Williams came up with — not to mention the clever dummy run by Scott Williams — was a joy to watch and very hard to defend.
The second half was all Wales to start with but you sensed that if England’s defence could hold firm, then they would come back late on because it is in this group’s DNA. They know no other way and Eddie Jones has tapped into that, or perhaps inspired it. Perhaps a bit of both.