Two minutes to play, France are trailing by one, and Thomas Ramos is standing over the ball on the halfway line, shaping to take the kick that will provide the final twist in this topsy-turvy championship. England had only just scored themselves to retake the lead in a game they seemed to have already lost and won and lost all over again. They did it with a fine try from a lineout inside the France 22. Danny Care to Manu Tuilagi, snap, Care to Maro Itoje, crackle, and Care to Tommy Freeman, pop. He slid over the tryline in the right corner and for all of three minutes, they were about to win a famous victory. But Ramos’s kick yanked it back again.
It was that sort of match. It swung wildly in the night-time breeze, one way then the other. England were 13 points down in one moment, and eight points up again in the very next. It was sloppy and exuberant and exhausted, like a game played in the hallways on the last day of term. Ireland had already won the title when they beat Scotland in Dublin earlier in the afternoon. But, shattered as everyone on the pitch was at the end of the championship, they played merry havoc here in Lyon, even though there was nothing much to win from doing it, thinking, perhaps, that it will be months till they have another chance to go again.
