The dressing room after defeat in your opening match in the Six Nations is a hard place to be.
You sit there gutted, and it’s a quiet place, because every player in every team dreams in early February of walking away with a Grand Slam come the end of March.
You can’t guarantee any of that, of course, in the first weekend, but you want to give yourself the best possible chance.
When you lose, it sucks the momentum out of the team and the strength out of your legs. You don’t want to move from the dressing room but you don’t want to stay there either.
If you can hear the celebrations coming from the opposition across the corridor, or the supporters in the stands above you, it just makes it worse.
So England will be feeling low after what happened in Dublin a week ago. After the first 50 minutes they would have felt like they were in with a sniff of a big away win, leading 10-5 before the Irish roared back with a 22-point burst.
England were beaten 27-22 by Ireland in their opening Six Nations clash in Dublin last weekend
Ireland roared back with a 22-point burst in Dublin after England had started the game well
But what Steve Borthwick is really good at as a coach is in giving you a bit of time to wallow in it, to be cheesed off.
When he sees you’ve done that, he thanks you for the effort you all put in. He highlights what you’ve done well.
He’ll talk about a couple of areas you’ll want to fix up, and he’ll set up a debrief for the Sunday or Monday, but very quickly he moves your narrative on.
He tells you what you’re going to work on; he gives you the momentum to look forward rather than back.
Critically, he takes the emotion out of it. He gives you a focus you might otherwise lack. By the start of game week he has you thinking: ‘Actually, you’re right, our world hasn’t entirely ended.’
I went into the England camp on Tuesday. The boys were in good spirits, flying into training.
The beauty of this group is that, while they might be lacking experience, there is bags of energy and a tangible desire to learn. That can take you a long way after a tough defeat.
There’s been a lot of noise in the media about England losing again, and quite a few of the boys have noticed that.
Maro Itoje leads the England team in a huddle back at their Pennyhill Park base this week
Steve Borthwick is really good as a coach in giving you a bit of time to be cheesed off
The England players have noticed the outside noise and there has been talk of it in camp
There’s been talk about it in the inner circle. It can be hard to ignore this sort of outside noise, but as an international player you have to learn to.
You tell yourself: do we really care? That noise doesn’t scrum down with you or score you tries. So find something else. Find something real.
This is the sort of game where you have to get selection right. There’s been lots of pressure to include both Smiths, and Steve has gone for it, slotting in Fin at 10 and Marcus at 15.
In some ways I’m not surprised, but Marcus has arguably been one of England’s best players over the past 10 games. He’s had a few cameos at 15, but I do feel we either stick with him at fly-half or we don’t.
There’s been lots of pressure to include both Smiths, and Steve has gone for it, slotting in Fin at 10 and Marcus at 15
When I saw the England players they were desperate for a win – any way they can get there
I can understand why Steve Borthwick is trying to shoehorn his best players in – but I would prefer a bit more identity, shape and cohesion
We have this thing in English rugby where we’re still trying to shoehorn certain players in, like we used to with George Ford and Owen Farrell.
I can understand Steve Borthwick’s point of view; he wants to get his best players on the pitch together. But I like the idea of deciding on your best players and then picking them. It gives you an identity. It gives you shape, and it gives you cohesion.
They’re desperate for a win, England. There’s a lot of talk about green shoots, and new players being blooded. But you need wins at the top level. Seven defeats out of 10 isn’t good enough.
How the win comes matters less. Any way you can get there, you get there.
