Boxers can train with one hand tied behind their back, snooker players can practise with smaller pockets and golfers can hit heavier balls on the range but they’d all claim that nothing really prepares you for a true test in the white heat of battle.
It explains why the eyes of England’s head coach, Simon Middleton, light up when discussing his side’s grand slam decider in France, when they will put a 22-match winning run on the line against the last team to beat them in the Six Nations, four years ago.
For all that England speak of squad rotation in the early rounds, of improving throughout each match, of using internal pressure to maintain high standards, the three-times defending champions are evidently aching for the kind of challenge that few teams pose. France are one of those and the fixture takes on far greater significance with the delayed World Cup to be held this autumn in New Zealand – arguably the only other team on a similar level.
There is a certain irony that his England men’s counterpart, Eddie Jones, is criticised for prioritising the World Cup and treating the Six Nations as second-rate whereas Middleton is happy to admit that his side are not the finished article and, “that’s the very last thing we want to be at this point in time”, but perhaps it is an unfair comparison considering this is the first time the annual championship has had a title sponsor and there is still no prize money on offer.
Saturday’s fixture must therefore be seen in the context of the World Cup and while you could put the mortgage on both sides making the knockout stages, the fact England and France are in the same pool adds further spice. “It is winner-takes-all which is literally what knockout rugby is, whether it’s quarter-final, semi-final or final, so it is certainly brilliant practice for the occasions hopefully we’ll be a part of later in the year,” says England’s captain for the day, Emily Scarratt. “Winner-takes-all games are different, they come with pressure naturally, but they are brilliant tests and you don’t get to play in them particularly often. The way the Six Nations has panned out it gives us that opportunity.”
If the World Cup narrative is inescapable, the fact the competition has reached this climax – like England, France have won all four matches – is no surprise. It would have been a huge shock had either side slipped up against the other nations and if it makes for a prescribed sense of theatre on the final weekend, the standard of competition so far has not matched the burgeoning interest.
England arrived in the Basque country on the back of two consecutive record crowds and Saturday’s clash has long been a sell-out. If the Stade Jean Dauger in Bayonne were not undergoing renovation there would be considerably more than the 11,000 expected and the fact it will be broadcast on BBC2 is also significant. The organiser could do with a contest, with a one-score game with five minutes to go, because dominant superiority does little to advance a developing sport and as much as England are bracing themselves for a sterner test, there remains the possibility that they could sweep France aside.
The French press certainly make England favourites. Inevitably the chance to follow in the footsteps of Antoine Dupont’s side has been mentioned plenty this week – their under-18s sides were both triumphant too – but France have not put away Scotland, Ireland and Wales with the same imperiousness as England. They average 35 points per match to England’s 64.5, have scored 20 tries to England’s 42 and it was telling to hear their scrum-half Laure Sansus concede that they have nothing to lose. Still, the hope is that the hostile crowd in Bayonne knocks England from their stride and it says a lot about the occasion that Middleton describes it as the toughest match in the international game at present. Arguably, though, that says more about the plight of the Black Ferns, winners of five of the last six World Cups but comfortably beaten by both England and France last autumn. The decision to call on the services of Wayne Smith to shake things up before their home tournament is, in the main, a compliment to both England and France.
“For us [the match] has a number of values – winning the tournament first and foremost, with a Six Nations and a grand slam that comes with it,” says Middleton. “But for us it will be a benchmark or a proving point of where we’re at and that’s probably as important for us, given the nature of this year, as any result.”
While tournament officials may not want to hear it, that is Middleton’s priority. He describes the match as “win-win – but I know which side of that we want to be on” but you sense he would not be despondent if his side are behind on the scoreboard in the closing stages. It was the kind of thing you’d hear the All Blacks saying around the time the British & Irish Lions were touring in 2017.
Back then it sounded like face-saving, bordering on arrogance, but look at how their Super Rugby teams no longer face the South African franchises – something the All Blacks head coach, Ian Foster, lamented this week – or how the Springboks are making overtures towards the Six Nations and the problem presented by the absence of genuine competition becomes clear. The depth of genuine quality in the women’s game is considerably shallower than the men’s so it stands to reason that England, just like France, feel they have little to lose on Saturday.
“We’ll come up against a side who will be stronger defensively than we’ve played and I’d imagine the share of possession will be even and we’ve tended to dominate possession,” says Middleton. “Less possession means you’ve got to be more clinical. The key is that it’s winner-takes-all and they come so few and far between. They are really special occasions to be involved in. Why are we in the business? To get to these moments so we can see how good we are.”
