By Mitch Phillips
LONDON (Reuters) -England turned to their “Bomb Squad” to get their Autumn campaign off to a convincing start with a dominant 25-7 victory over a tired and toothless Australia at Twickenham on Saturday and make it eight wins in a row.
Leading 10-7 in the second half, the introduction of five British and Irish Lions forward replacements helped England add tries through Henry Pollock, Alex Mitchell and Luke Cowan-Dickie to give the scoreboard a more accurate reflection of the game.
Flyhalf George Ford, selected to start after his impressive displays on England’s tour of Argentina and the United States, said it had been a tricky afternoon.
“The first game is notoriously difficult,” he said.” The intercept could maybe cloud your judgement of the game. We had to regroup and calm down.
“We know that with our set-piece and the lads coming off the bench that they were going to add some impetus.”
Australia always looked like they might be in for a tough afternoon as, with the match falling outside World Rugby’s window, they were without several key players not released by European clubs.
SUB-OPTIMAL AUSTRALIA
Even taking that into account, however, it was a sub-optimal Australia performance, particularly in attack where they rarely threatened and scored their sole try via a long-range interception.
England failed to turn a lot of early goalline possession into points and went ahead only after 20 minutes with a Ford penalty.
A minute later it was 10-0 when Earl sprinted clear for the first try after Tom Roebuck outjumped Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii.
Australia struggled to make any impact, with no sign of their trademark backline speed and invention, and only desperate defence prevented Earl claiming a second try when he was held up by Harry Potter over the line after a sharp England move.
Potter turned attacker with an 90-metre interception try when a home score looked certain, and England were only 10-7 ahead at halftime.
After a scrappy opening 10 minutes in the second half, Borthwick took decisive action by throwing on five forward replacements – a new front row plus Pollock, and, for his first rugby of the season, flanker Tom Curry.
The crowd welcomed the move, desperate to see England get their talented backs involved to put away a disconnected Wallaby side.
But it was bleach-haired Pollock who got them out of their seats as he brilliantly scooped up a loose ball after Roebuck batted back an up and under to dive over.
Scrumhalf Mitchell scored a clever third, sniping from the back of maul, and an unstoppable 30-metre maul enabled replacement hooker Cowan-Dickie to mark his 50th appearance with the fourth.
England will face Fiji, New Zealand and Argentina over the next three weeks with real belief that they can win all three games.
Australia, desperate to try to overhaul the Pumas and snatch the vital sixth spot in the world rankings ahead of next month’s 2027 World Cup draw, will need a radical improvement as they play Italy, Ireland and France.
“If we don’t get to sixth in the world (which earns a top seeding at the RWC), all we can do is keep building,” coach Joe Schmidt said. “We need to build some depth and that’s what this tour is about too.”
Looking ahead, captain Harry Wilson said: “We will have to be a hell of a lot better than we were tonight.”
Schmidt agreed that the England bench turned the match.
“They made a difference, they brought a step up in intensity,” he said. “But there are no excuses, they deserved to win the game, they bring a lot of intensity here.”
(Reporting by Mitch Phillips, editing by Pritha Sarkar and Ed Osmond)
