England's Key Battles

France beat England 12-10 on a rain soaked evening in Paris to clinch their ninth Grand Slam.

However England came close to ruining the party, and would have won the game if they hadn't missed a couple of scoring chances.

But there is still plenty to smile about if you're an England fan.

OK, so England should have scored at least one more try.  It's also true that Martin Johnson's men were unable to convert their lion's share of possesion into match-winning points. 

But despite the difficult conditions England showed flashes of brilliance which have been sadly missing from their previous performances in the tournament.

Ben Foden scored a sensational try after five minutes, when England quickly worked the ball through several pairs of hands and exposed France's half-arsed defence.

Unfortunately Chris Ashton kicked away a prime try-scoring chance, but other than that he made a solid debut.  Mike Tindall came back from nowhere and put in a great performance.  In fact, England's backline looked much more threatening as a whole.  There were still problems at scrum time, with prop Dan Cole looking a bit shaky and hooker Dylan Hartley was a little inconsistent.

However, as an England fan, I feel much happier about their performance.  I just hope Martin Johnson remembers how successful the Ben Foden/Chris Ashton experiment was come the summer tour.

All that aside,  during the game I noticed a few key battles which I'd like to draw your attention to:


Martin Johnson 0 v 1 Crazy French Lady

Or Raphael Ibanez's mother-in-law to use her correct title.  The England coach really had his work cut out, as Ibanez's rather vocal relative let Johnno know exactly what she felt about his team.

"Sit DOWN!"

Brian Moore 1 v 0 Referee Bryce Lawrence

Beware rugby officials everywhere.  Brian Moore, ex-hooker and now BBC pundit, is ready to hunt you down.  The former England front row is now a fully qualified referee - and don't we know it.  To give Brian his dues, he was right when he called Bryce's performance "below average".  The ref got a couple of blindingly obvious decisions wrong, and Moore duly savaged him like a rabid dog.

Martin Johnson 1 v 0 Bryce Lawrence

During the first half, referee Lawrence got it into his head that England prop Dan Cole was to blame for all of the problems at scrum time.  Cole was pinged again and again and again.  OK so he was at fault on a couple of occasions, but the Leicester loosehead seemed to cop the flak for pretty much everything.  Well ha ha to you ref.  Johnno shocked pretty much everyone at the start of the second half when David Wilson and Steve Thompson ran out to replace Cole and hooker Dylan Hartley.  But the strategy worked: the scrum steadied and the ref couldn't pin everything on Cole.  Excellent tactics.

Mike Tindall 1 v 0 Harry Potter

When it was announced that Gloucester centre Tindall was back in the number 13 shirt I sighed in frustration.  However, how wrong I was.  Good old Tinds had a fantastic game with his strong, direct running and he was one of England's best players.  When boy wizard look-a-like Mathew Tait swapped places with Tinds, England lost a lot of their momentum.  Tindall might not be a man for the future, but he certainly was more magical than Tait in this game.


Heaven 1 - 0 Earth

The heavens above Paris opened and the Stade de France pitch was duly unearthed.  Massive clods of grass were popping up everywhere.  In fact, it looked like an army of moles had taken residence and the rumbling French scrum had caused them to burrow to the surface to see what all the noise was about.  Pas bien.  It was also pretty dangerous.  I mean, tiny France Wing Marc Andreu could have easily disappeared forever down one of the holes.


Regardless of all of the above, it was a good game.  France weren't the best team on the day, but they were the best team in the tournament by far and fully deserved to win the Grand Slam.

Next year England.  Next year....