Steve Borthwick’s men were invited to a dance and had all the moves, reacting to a classic try with one of their own
Something is happening in south-west London. The statistics will give you a hint of it – England have won nine Tests in a row and haven’t lost at home all year – but the sight of the way they played here in the second half against Fiji says more about what’s going on than the numbers do.
England, whisper it, turned in a brilliantly entertaining 40 minutes of freewheeling rugby against a Fiji team who are a hell of a lot better than their ninth-placed standing in the world rankings suggests. The Fijians invited England to a dance, and, glory be, Steve Borthwick’s team were delighted to take them up on it. You can only wonder what Borthwick made of it from his spot up in the coaches’ row.
Thirty minutes in, this was going to be a very different article. It had a smart alec intro all about how there’s a big red button in a case on the back wall of the ground announcer’s box at Twickenham, with the words “Only to be used in emergencies” written across the top. Break the glass, and Sweet Caroline starts pumping out around the ground. “Where it began, I can’t begin to know when …” It’s true that the Rugby Football Union is desperate to move on from this sort of thing. These days the Twickenham playlist is tailored to the kids of the people who pay for the tickets.
