Arriving at Twickenham on the back of two straight defeats in the Championship, France were much improved and led 10-9 at the interval thanks to Wesley Fofana’s superb try.

After the break scrum-half Morgan Parra, restored to the starting XV alongside fly-half Francois Trinh-Duc, missed two penalties and England made France pay with Owen Farrell kicking England back ahead.

Manu Tuilagi then scored England’s only try and as les Bleus made a raft of replacements, the visitors could only add one more Frederic Michalak penalty while Toby Flood’s two made the game safe.

And Saint-Andre believes England were there for the taking at the start of the first half, bemoaning the lack of impact made by his replacements.

“We expected a little bit more from our bench,” he said. “So many times we tried impossible offloads and lost the ball in the contact area and England didn't do amazing things, but they were accurate and we were not accurate enough.

“In the ruck area we were quite strong, but we were penalised a lot.

“We had an opportunity at 10-9 for more points when England were not as confident, but we didn't take it. We have to learn from this and carry on.

“We are very sad, but we know this team have a lot of potential and each game we will get better. Losing is terrible, but the team must keep this memory and work to improve. The small details at the moment are not on our side.”