SIX NATIONS: PREVIEWS: England v Scotland:IT IS Scotland's misfortune today to be facing an England team finishing the season stronger than anyone else. Even with a six-day turn-around from the French game, there is a spring in the step of the hosts to match the fresh blossom on the trees outside. It is as if someone has flicked a switch and reminded everyone that representing your country is to be relished rather than grimly endured.
Of course there is a danger of over-confidence, but Martin Johnson’s relaxed demeanour yesterday was born of quiet satisfaction rather than complacency. There is nothing sweeter to a manager’s cauliflowered ears than hearing players being fiercely self-critical in the wake of a 24-point win over France.
History also exerts a gravitational pull: Johnson was four days short of his 13th birthday the last time the Scots won at Twickenham in 1983. You can almost picture the young Johnno jabbing a taped-up finger at the television and vowing it would never happen again.
For all Scotland’s ability in certain areas of the field, it is an equally uncomfortable fact that they have leaked at least 40 points on each of their last four trips to London. Two years ago they were unlucky to run into a rampant Jonny Wilkinson in a game also refereed by today’s official, South Africa’s Marius Jonker, but the omens are not great from any tartan perspective.
This afternoon’s forecast offers no wet-weather respite, and Toby Flood and Joe Worsley have been declared fit.
More ominously still, England feel they can improve significantly on last weekend’s French revelation. Johnson has been reiterating the importance of minor details in the great scheme of things.
“People start talking about ‘ambition’ and ‘taking the shackles off’ and all those other expressions they like to use, but four of our tries came from turnovers. You have to out-work and out-enthuse teams otherwise those opportunities won’t come. The way people are talking it’s as if we only have to turn up to win. That’s crazy. It’s going to be a battle.”
Scotland’s Frank Hadden, for his part, needs his players to conjure something special to avoid ending the season with only a solitary home win over Italy. Given he described his squad beforehand as the strongest he has presided over, the Scots’ tally of four tries from four games is not much of a safety-net prior to next month’s formal review of his position.
GuardianService
ENGLAND: D Armitage; U Monye, M Tindall, R Flutey, M Cueto; T Flood, H Ellis; A Sheridan, L Mears, P Vickery, S Borthwick (capt), S Shaw, T Croft, J Easter, N Worsley. Replacements: D Hartley, J White, J Haskell, N Kennedy, D Care, A Goode, M Tait.
SCOTLAND: C Paterson; S Danielli, M Evans, G Morrison, T Evans; Phil Godman, M Blair (capt); A Dickinson, R Ford, E Murray, J White, J Hamilton, A Strokosch, S Taylor, S Gray. Replacements: D Hall, M Low, N Hines, K Brown, C Cusiter, N De Luca, H Southwell.
Referee: Marius Jonker (Rsa).
