{"id":465489,"date":"2026-03-09T06:52:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-09T06:52:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/465489\/"},"modified":"2026-03-09T06:52:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-09T06:52:11","slug":"six-nations-englands-kick-heavy-strategy-failed-them-in-defeat-by-italy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/465489\/","title":{"rendered":"Six Nations: ‘England’s kick-heavy strategy failed them in defeat by Italy’"},"content":{"rendered":"

I did not enjoy my first few games for England.<\/p>\n

My first cap came in 1995 and I started all four games in the 1996 Five Nations, which we won on the final game.<\/p>\n

I may have been living the dream, but it was not much fun to play in.<\/p>\n

Pass and kick – I was under very clear and rigid instructions.<\/p>\n

My running game helped me gain international recognition, but I was unable to express myself on the field.<\/p>\n

As my confidence grew, I understood that going off script was not a rebellion if done at the right time.<\/p>\n

In fact, it gained you more respect – if the decision was the right one – from the coaching staff.<\/p>\n

Being brave enough to say in a huddle “guys, we do need to do X, Y and Z here to win” is what I want from this England team.<\/p>\n

I know I sound like a broken record, but only a player has a feel for the game on the pitch.<\/p>\n

England stuck to their box-kick-heavy strategy in the 23-18 Six Nations defeat by Italy<\/a> and it failed them.<\/p>\n

Right on half-time in Rome, Fin Smith took the ball and went off script, bouncing to the blindside to find Tom Roebuck with a neat cross-field kick for England’s try.<\/p>\n

Would head coach Steve Borthwick have gone after him in the changing room for playing heads-up rugby? No.<\/p>\n

Smith was brave and delivered the right decision under pressure.<\/p>\n

That is the only major player-led decision that jumps out at me from Saturday’s historic defeat.<\/p>\n

It is difficult to list which individuals played badly against Italy – it was just silly errors at key times.<\/p>\n

Sam Underhill and Maro Itoje were both having good games, but their second-half yellow cards proved costly.<\/p>\n

Underhill’s high tackle can happen, but Itoje’s penalty was a rush of blood to the head and showed a lack of clear thinking.<\/p>\n

It put England in a pressure situation that they simply could not rise to in the final quarter.<\/p>\n

Their ability to adapt to a changing picture in front of them has been a weakness all tournament.<\/p>\n

There was no urgency until the last passage of play, when the shackles came off and Ollie Chessum broke clear.<\/p>\n

The talent within this squad is so clear, but they are performing under their potential.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I did not enjoy my first few games for England. My first cap came in 1995 and I…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":239713,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-465489","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\/465489","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=465489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465489\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/239713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}