Steve Borthwick must have watched these semi-finals and wondered what’s happening in the Prem.

When he took Leicester Tigers to the Prem title in 2022, he did it off relentless defence and as little attack, and its corresponding risk, as he could get away with. The 3.7 tries per match his side scored that season are better than only three teams this year.

The Prem has never seen such turbo-charged attack, or lack of interest in defence, yet it doesn’t seem that has filtered up to the man leading England, who still insists on taming the talents who come into his camps.

Back yourself.

Running it out of our own 22 and scoring the fastest-ever PREM Play-Off try after just 87 seconds 🤯 pic.twitter.com/FGnPgDQT7B

— Northampton Saints 😇 (@SaintsRugby) June 13, 2026

At a raucous Franklin’s Gardens on Friday night, Northampton Saints opened the scoring from their own 22. Scrum-half Archie McParland noticed an opportunity to beat prop Nicky Smith and then fed Henry Pollock, who would have been told off for running away from his support by coaches up and down the country.

The phenom bounced to the wing and gave centre Rory Hutchinson the ball. He chucked it back inside to where he knew trailing players would be and it bounced into the hands of McParland. A couple of phases later and Tom Litchfield ghosted through to open the scoring. This was total rugby led by two men: head coach Phil Dowson and attack coach Sam Vesty. Many feel they would inject this freewheeling verve into England.

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The criticism of Borthwick is that he has taken the young, talented players of the country and stifled their creativity by forcing them into a structure when none exists at their club. England players are overcoached, while players with Saints, Bath or Bristol are simply given the tools and sent out to be creative.

The evidence in favour of that is the aforementioned Pollock. He made 23 carries on Friday night, some in space, others where he was asked to hit a brick wall of Leicester defenders and find a weakness. Twenty-three carries is just one fewer than he made across the entire Six Nations when he was sent out to the wings.

The received wisdom is that he is too small to find those same weaknesses in fringe defences populated by international players. But as New Zealand wing Mark Tele’a showed at the last World Cup, players with agile footwork can be mightily effective in tight spaces in-field.

Tigers have evolved from the team Borthwick took over after they had sailed perilously close to relegation. He brought them back into contention with a simple game plan which removed risk and with it the creativity and spark the Saints now play with. The Tigers have evolved since then, but this match still felt like a referendum on whether pragmatism or unbridled total rugby is the right way to set up the national team.

Two men unfairly caught in the middle of that debate are Freddie Steward and Jack van Poortvliet. In parody form, Steward is the lumbering full-back capable only of diffusing bombs and Van Poortvliet the box kicker par excellence.

Both did those jobs well in the semi-final. Leicester’s second try came from a long clearing Van Poortvliet kick.

Saints messed up the lineout, Leicester won the scrum penalty and picked-and-went until Steward used his height to stretch over the line.

There was no length-of-the-field break or highlight-worthy clip, just a steady application of pressure to take the lead.

Borthwick would point to that pressure, both in the first semi-final and the barnstorming second, which saw Exeter upset the favourites Bath at the Rec.

In free flow, Bath are a dream. Alfie Barbeary fills the Pollock role as a back in attack and a forward in defence. They are a team allowed to play with the handbrake off. In the first minute, fullback Tom de Glanville took a high ball and offloaded it in the same action simply to where someone should be.

It bounced into Bath hands and they were off, 30m from their own line. That style gave them a 26-10 half-time lead.

Then Exeter changed their front row, momentum swung, and despite more than 40 phases on the Exeter try line, Bath lost.

By the end, Bath were reverting to the structure they supposedly don’t possess. The free wheels had come off in the face of a blanket and brutal Chiefs defence.

Modern rugby is a game of attack; Northampton are in a Prem final despite conceding 30 points or more in their last seven matches.

But this style has weaknesses, glaring ones. The quality of Prem defences makes these attacks glow in a way International defences simply wouldn’t.

The Prem is full of centres or wingers, there for what they do with the ball, not what they do without it. Borthwick will be grateful for the developments at the club level, which give him a growing toybox of skilful players with which to work, and he should root around in it more.

But, he’s right not to dive into all out attack despite the external pressures. He will point to the Saints’ desire to escape from deep which resulted in turnovers twice on Friday and are unsuccessful more often than any other side. They’re exciting when they work but an international side like France would be licking their lips.