Team Statistics onlyinclude Five & Six Nations games from 1992 to the present day
Player Statistics onlyinclude Five & Six Nations appearances since 1992
Brian Ashton
'A catalogue of catastrophes'
4 February 2008, 4:54 pm
Like everyone else I was very disappointed with the defeat to Wales, especially after the first 40 minutes where England were in such a dominant position. They perhaps could have had more points on the board at half-time but the Welsh did really well to keep England out in the last 10 minutes of the first half.
I would be very interested to know what Brian Ashton and Warren Gatland said at half-time to see two different responses - with England going backwards and Wales going forwards.
It’s tough when you see quality players going off like David Strettle, who is one of my players to watch for the RBS 6 Nations. It’s the same with Lewis Moody and Tom Rees. If you lose three players like that it makes a huge difference to your team performance. And Mike Tindall going off, on top of that, throws the whole team into disarray.
When things looked tough a few of the experienced players did not really perform. When you put all that together it really was a catalogue of errors, injuries and catastrophes.
You cannot take anything away from Wales. They hung in there and scored two late tries exactly like in 1988 - the last time they won at Twickenham.
It is fortunate that England have got Italy coming up next - probably the weakest team in the tournament even though they ran Ireland pretty close on Saturday.
I don’t see them having the firepower to knock England over but if we take Italy lightly they could be in trouble.
Brian Ashton has got to look for some sought of continuity but he will be having a word with a few senior players about their performances and saying ‘if you play that badly against Italy you won’t be getting a third chance’.
With the injuries it’s the perfect opportunity for a lot of players to come in but I don’t really see wholesale changes because it’s important to give a side games to get used to each other.
Italy’s forwards are very big and aggressive and their backs can score tries but sometimes they lack the patience to create them.
England can frustrate Italy by dominating in the line-out and the scrum but they have got to be more incisive when it comes to scoring tries.
It’s tough when you see quality players going off like David Strettle, who is one of my players to watch for the RBS 6 Nations. It’s the same with Lewis Moody and Tom Rees. If you lose three players like that it makes a huge difference to your team performance. And Mike Tindall going off, on top of that, throws the whole team into disarray.
When things looked tough a few of the experienced players did not really perform. When you put all that together it really was a catalogue of errors, injuries and catastrophes.
You cannot take anything away from Wales. They hung in there and scored two late tries exactly like in 1988 - the last time they won at Twickenham.
It is fortunate that England have got Italy coming up next - probably the weakest team in the tournament even though they ran Ireland pretty close on Saturday.
I don’t see them having the firepower to knock England over but if we take Italy lightly they could be in trouble.
Brian Ashton has got to look for some sought of continuity but he will be having a word with a few senior players about their performances and saying ‘if you play that badly against Italy you won’t be getting a third chance’.
With the injuries it’s the perfect opportunity for a lot of players to come in but I don’t really see wholesale changes because it’s important to give a side games to get used to each other.
Italy’s forwards are very big and aggressive and their backs can score tries but sometimes they lack the patience to create them.
England can frustrate Italy by dominating in the line-out and the scrum but they have got to be more incisive when it comes to scoring tries.