England 71-0 Chile: Rugby World Cup Match Review
Rugby World Cup star Danny Care has admitted England deserved stick for their pragmatic performances ahead of their 71-0 thrashing of Chile on Saturday. Care was handed his first start of the tournament against the South Americans and featured for 50 minutes before being replaced by Ben Youngs.
England had frustrated their fans as well as pundits during their opening two games of the tournament after favouring a kicking game over a free-flowing, attacking style of rugby. But Steve Borthwick’s men changed tack against Chile at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy in Lille as they ran rampant and racked up 11 tries.
“We get it,” Care said after the match. “I probably get it more than anyone, having been out of it and watching that team thinking, ‘when are they going to let loose and show what we really want to see?’ In the first two games, England were still getting stick for how we played, but I thought we showed it here. We are sat here – three [wins] from three – and we’ve taken another step forward.”
And discussing the victory, the 36-year-old explained: “One of our goals was to try and concede no tries in this game. We knew it was going to be really tough. I want to give massive credit to Chile, they fought from minute one to minute 80 and it was a real test for us.
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“I’m pleased with our performance – three from three – plenty of scores on the board for us. To shut them out was really pleasing and now all eyes are on Samoa. A few days off for us and then back into training and then all eyes on Samoa in two weeks’ time, which is going to be a really, really tough Test match.”
Meanwhile, England attack coach Richard Wigglesworth has extolled Marcus Smith after the Harlequins player was asked to play at full-back rather than in his usual position of fly-half. Smith was in scintillating form during the encounter and crossed the whitewash for two tries.
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“We were really impressed by him,” Wigglesworth said. “He looked great didn’t he. We’ve let Marcus do it the Marcus way because we want Marcus Smith to look like Marcus Smith at full-back, no one else.
“He has just ripped into that role. There hasn’t been a hint of, ‘oh this isn’t quite my preferred position or the one that I’ve played and played very successfully for my whole career.’ He’s not done that, he has just gone, ‘let me make an impact on this team, on the players around me.’ And he has been first-class.”
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