England head coach Steve Borthwick has given his verdict on whether his team are still on track to succeed at the 2027 World Cup, and has assessed whether he is still the man for the job.<\/p>\n
Claiming that the group aren\u2019t \u201chiding away\u201d from their recent lack of form, Borthwick insists that the side\u2019s growth over the past 12 months has been \u201cvery strong\u201d.<\/p>\n
Despite heading for their worst-ever Six Nations finish, Borthwick<\/a> insists that he is still the man to lead the national side.<\/p>\n \u201cAbsolutely,\u201d he said when questioned if he was the man for the job. \u201cThis particular year, the Six Nations before the World Cup, we\u2019ve seen it before with the England<\/a> team going back to 2018 in particular, then the team was in a very good place the following year at the World Cup.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s tough losing. We are not hiding away from the fact that we are not where we want to be in terms of results and performances. I said to you that the intensity in the last game wasn\u2019t where it needed to be. I thought the intensity was much improved. For 60 minutes, the team did a lot of good things today.\u201d<\/p>\n Italy v England: Winners and losers as Azzurri remove Red Rose \u2018thorn\u2019 in style leaving Steve Borthwick \u2018on thin ice\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n Heading into this campaign, England were considered one of the favourites to lift the trophy. They\u2019ve not just become a bad team overnight.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can see the vision of where the team is going to be, you see the nature of the players coming through,\u201d continued the England coach.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a tough period, and what we will do is learn from it and make sure that we\u2019re a stronger team going forward.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI recognise that they are hurting\u201d<\/p>\n Addressing the criticism his side is facing, Borthwick turned his attention to the \u201churting\u201d fans.<\/p>\n \u201cFirstly, I would like to thank the supporters for what they give to the team,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cSecondly, I recognise that they are hurting like we are hurting. We feel it, we really, really do. We\u2019re not shying away from that fact. These are not the performances and results we want to give our supporters.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the last period of time, I think we have brought the supporters on a journey with us, playing the attacking rugby they want with the try-scoring we\u2019ve done over the last 12 months, and the way we\u2019ve tried to play has been very good.<\/p>\n Want more from Planet Rugby? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list<\/a> for world-class coverage you can trust.<\/p>\n \u201cUnfortunately, right now those tries aren\u2019t flowing the way we want them to be. We can\u2019t get across the try-line anywhere near as regularly as we were, or as often as we want.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are a couple of factors within that, one of them is certainly the contact area, which is certainly really, really hard fought right now. We will make sure we improve on that ahead of France next week.\u201d<\/p>\n