EXCLUSIVE - England lose second young star to ACL injury

All England coaches face intense media scutiny and Borthwick is no exception. The media pressure is a reflection of the fact ppl don't want to pay 150 quid for a Twickers ticket to watch the ball being booted up in the air all day.

Incidentally, England had two decent performances in the WC [and throughout 2023 as a whole] playing the way you favour and one was in the semi-final and the other v Argy in the pool.

For the rest of 2023, they were somewhere between dire and uninspired. So how do you work out SB abandoned a 'winning method' on that basis?

So basically you want to start again from the WC semi-final side?

"he highly organized Irish attack was also another that didn't require much from the 10"

no, it required a lot from the 10, hence why they thrived with a George Ford style organiser in Johnny Sexton.

"it is in fact your two which would require even more change to make the most of than Marcus Smith"

my two being Ford and Fin? That's just demonstrably false. England have looked far superior with Ford at 10 than they have with Marcus.

Given that you work in the media I don't think you should be simply pointing to the existence of detrimental media pressure, you should be doing what you can to shape the narrative. Do you think Borthwick should have faced the sack if he didn't produce an entertaining product? do you think it is right or wrong that building a team around Marcus Smith is seen as a test case for England playing better rugby?

In terms of who has the most growth left in them, its Fin. I think we can say that with certainty now that Marcus has been England's main man for almost 4 years (since summer 2021 Smith has started 26 tests at fly-half; Ford has started 10; and Farrell 18 at fly-half or inside centre) and performances have got consistently worse throughout that time.

Fin runs it a lot more than Ford (although so did Ford when he was younger!) but in terms of his connectivity to his forwards pods he's a lot closer to Ford than to Marcus. Dan Biggar agrees with me, if that's worth anything.

So in the first instance you are underestimating the impact of media pressure on his tenure. He had to do a lot more with the players at his disposal or he would have been out. To his credit he has tried to do that.

Building a team around Marcus Smith is seen as a test-case [rightly or wrongly] in that view, esp as he has been prepared for the role for about 4 years now after being anointed the wunderkind of English rugby by Eddie.

I'd agree that going back to Ford still has merit as he can prob play the position in more ways than Marcus, but he was also a part of the three underwhelming results with which the 24 6N started. So I doubt he will be see as part of the solution now.

It will come down to Marcus v Fin and that is more interesting. One plays in a turnover-based attack, the other in a Leinster-style possession offence. Who has the most growth left in them?

You praise England for their performance v Ire and Fra, then imply they should go back to Freddie Steward 15 when George Furbank made most of the diff to those performances.

Anf Fin Smith is far closer to Marcus than he is to George Ford, that is why he plays for Saints not Sale.