Former England captain Dylan Hartley has claimed that Steve Borthwick’s facet are going through an “identification disaster” earlier than taking up Eire.
Stress has ramped up on Borthwick for a seemingly lack of long-term imaginative and prescient and Hartley has questioned an absence of readability on what the top coach needs England to be.
“When you concentrate on this England group, there’s a massive query round identification – there doesn’t appear to be one factor that you may cling your hat on and say “sure” that’s what this group is nice at,” he informed Playing Zone.
“Once I have a look at England, I see a group which can be making an attempt to evolve their attacking sport together with making an attempt to have a world-class set piece, and a ’new stage’ of defence, and for the time being, the defence is leaky and is exposing them.
“For those who have a look at what the All Blacks do, it’s such a low-risk defence. They’re simply up and out. They could concede 5 or ten yards, however then somebody like Sam Cane or Ardie Savea can type of seduce you into considering that you just’re making inroads, and so they flip you over. There may be an identification situation that England want to deal with.
“I’d wish to see what elements of the sport they will cling their hat on when the going will get powerful. At Twickenham, if it begins pissing down with rain and so they can expose Andrew Porter’s shoulder, it might be beautiful to fall again on to a set piece and a watertight hard-nosed defence.”
