As taken aback as I was by the honesty of Steve Borthwick when he said that he felt the England jersey was weighing heavily on his players, based on the evidence of the Scotland defeat I would agree with him. At times it looked like the players went into themselves after making mistakes and when you start compounding errors with more errors it is often a manifestation of what is going on mentally.
Identifying why is no easy task because when good players come into camp in form and on the back of impressive seasons, as a lot of this squad have, you expect that the shirt will elevate them because they are surrounded by the best players in the country and the best coaches, but it seems the jersey has been diminishing them. The hope is that they’ve addressed the necessary coping mechanisms should things start to unravel again.
