England 33-19 New Zealand
Borthwick’s side clinch a perfect 10 of successive wins
A perfect 10 wins in a row is a reliable indicator of a team on the rise. What England really craved, though, was a statement victory to underline just how far they have come in the past 18 months or so. And on a dull grey November afternoon they finally secured it, beating a disappointed New Zealand for the first time in south-west London for 13 long years.
They deserved it, too, storming back from 12-0 down to claim the kind of result that rewards all the painstaking hard work of both the players and the management. There were four English tries in all, including two in the final half hour from Fraser Dingwall and Tom Roebuck, as Steve Borthwick’s team become only the ninth England side to cut the All Blacks down to size.
The big result also owed a lot to one of the smaller men on the field. Borthwick predicted this week that George Ford would one day assume the England head coach mantle and the fly-half’s stock as a playmaker has rarely been higher. Two inch-perfect drop-goals in the first-half changed the momentum of the whole contest and, after the interval, his generalship helped to keep his teammates one step ahead of their pursuers.
