{"id":253007,"date":"2025-11-09T12:14:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-09T12:14:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/253007\/"},"modified":"2025-11-09T12:14:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-09T12:14:14","slug":"henry-arundell-x-factor-leads-englands-star-bench-against-fiji","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/253007\/","title":{"rendered":"Henry Arundell X-factor leads England’s star bench against Fiji"},"content":{"rendered":"

England have now won nine straight games – the last time they enjoyed a longer streak was an 18-game run from 2015 to 2017 during which they won their last Grand Slam.<\/p>\n

Having lost so many Tests by fine margins in the final quarter last year, England’s strength and depth is now showing.<\/p>\n

Fin Smith was back at fly-half against Fiji with his namesake Marcus Smith, another Lions tourist and fly-half, at full-back in a much-changed side.<\/p>\n

Both Smiths needed to grasp the opportunity with George Ford still believed to be the front-runner to start at fly-half against the All Blacks and Freddie Steward set to return from injury to contest the full-back position.<\/p>\n

Fin Smith, who admitted he was disappointed by his form<\/a> on the Lions tour, controlled the attack well and played the entire 80 minutes to prove his ability to come through sticky moments in games.<\/p>\n

Marcus Smith’s eye for a gap helped Arundell to his moment of glory, with his grubber kicking behind Fiji used regularly to good affect, but doubts still remain about his quality at full-back.<\/p>\n

“This team has come under a bit of criticism in tight games, certainly under my reign as captain [in 2024],” George told BBC Radio 5 Live.<\/p>\n

“We had composure and clarity in the huddle where I thought Fin Smith led really well.<\/p>\n

“When you’re bringing on the likes of Tom Curry and Maro, that sort of experience in the huddle is invaluable.<\/p>\n

“It’s all been part of the process. We’re still on the early part of the curve of becoming the team we want to be.<\/p>\n

“We do have an end goal of winning the World Cup but at the same time we are aware we need to be a significantly better team in order to do that.”<\/p>\n

Next Saturday, Borthwick’s side face a dangerous New Zealand team, who they lost narrowly against three times in 2024.<\/p>\n

Scott Robertson’s side also used their bench to defeat Scotland<\/a> late on after a score by replacement Damian McKenzie proved vital.<\/p>\n

“We look forward to it. Can’t wait,” said Ellis Genge, who captained England for the third time before Itoje’s arrival off the bench.<\/p>\n

“It will be a battle of attrition. In years gone by they’ve been known for chucking the ball about but they’ve got some big physical lumps in there now, so we’ll relish that.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"England have now won nine straight games – the last time they enjoyed a longer streak was an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":253008,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-253007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=253007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/253008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=253007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=253007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=253007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}