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Analysis: New kings of counter? The re-boot of England's transition game

By Ben Smith
England's 2019 return to form was driven by counter-attacking play. (Photos/Gettys Images)

When you think of counter-attacking rugby, England doesn’t first spring to mind.

Most will associate the free-flowing, unstructured intuitive style of play with the All Blacks. However, since their worst-ever finish in a Six Nations at the end of March 2018, England has re-booted this area of the game that has been so pivotal to their success under Jones.

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The arrival of attack coach Scott Wisemantel from Montpellier and former All Blacks head coach John Mitchell as an assistant would have no doubt brought fresh perspectives into England’s think tank.

Mitchell, in particular, is widely credited with recognising the under-utilised value of counter-attacking play in the 2000’s and would certainly have brought recommendations forward to Eddie Jones.

After each of the Six Nations championships in 2016 & 2017, the Wallabies were completely dismantled by the kicking game of England and their own turnovers at Twickenham, highlighting how effective counter-attacking play can be for England.

In the 2018 Six Nations Championship, zero tries came from counter-attack and just two from turnover ball for a measly total of 14 percent of all tries scored. Fast forward to the 2019 Six Nations and nearly half (47 percent) were scored from counter attacks and turnovers, according to Simon Gleave, head of sports analysis at Gracenote.

England’s game is still largely structured around kick pressure and territory gains through the air, however there has been a revived ability to score from unstructured situations and they way they have done this has still been uniquely English.

Personnel changes

The selection of highly skilled, well-conditioned ‘speed’ outside backs has proliferated over the last 18 months with the likes of Jonny May, Elliot Daly, Henry Slade, and Jack Nowell becoming the backbone of their number one backline, edging out Mike Brown, and the oft-injured Jonathan Joseph and Anthony Watson.

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Gifted athletes with evasive footwork and top-line speed, England’s outside backs are also all kicking options – Daly, May and Slade as left-footers and Nowell as a right-footer – while Daly and Slade are talented distributors. This unit collectively expanded and re-powered England’s counter game during the 2019 Six Nations.

Youngs and Farrell are the controllers in England’s kick-pressure game, but the outside backs have the license to kick in search of a ‘kill shot’, turning an unstructured moment into a foot race for seven points.

With speed across the park combined with quick and accurate decision-making, England’s ability to win these races has come back again.

While Daly can be fallible under the high ball at times, his presence at the back has ignited England’s return game off both turnovers and kicks.

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In the opening stages against France, a spilled ball is quickly moved to Daly out the back.

Although France actually have more numbers than England out to the far side, the use of blocking opens up a highway for the elusive Daly to cut through.

Kyle Sinckler (3) and Henry Slade (13) deliberately locate the nearest kick chasers and lightly obstruct them by taking the ideal body position to shield them away from Daly.

With the two shields in place, Daly has room to swerve upfield getting a one-on-one matchup in the open field against Camille Lopez.

The third shield by Jamie George gives Daly the time to re-accelerate after shaking the Lopez tackle.

The breach into the French backfield has been made and only the final defender, halfback Morgan Parra (9), awaits. Here is where the ‘kill shot’ via the kick comes, as Daly toes the grubber ahead for the flying Jonny May.

The formula is simple, find a way to breach the first level, kick past the last man and win the foot race.

A poor kick down the throat of Daly is returned on the opposite side of the field. England have more re-loading support players than Scotland have kick chasers, so could spark an opportunity here by creating an overlap.

A sharp left-foot step puts Scotland’s centre Nick Grigg off balance, triggering winger Byron McGuigan (11) to bite in on the tackle.

Daly draws in the two defenders before freeing up his ball-carrying arm and getting an offload away to Jack Nowell (14) in the clear.

With Ben Youngs (9) looping around, England breach Scotland’s flimsy kick-chase edge defence and find the last man again.

Jack Nowell opts for the chip kick over Sean Maitland and only a wicked bounce in-field prevents Ben Youngs getting an easy try. Youngs gets a slight touch on the ball in competition with Ali Price when trying to ground it and a knock-on is called.

If the opposition turns the ball over inside their own half, England has shown collective enterprise similar to that of the All Blacks.

Quick handling and offloading have been used to move the ball towards the edge where Daly and Slade can inject. If England succeeds in making a breach, the kick can be used if the space in behind, or on the next phase while the back three is compromised.

England’s three-zone kicking game often leads to turnovers direct from spilled aerial contests, which present the perfect opportunity to land a kill shot. Against France, this was frequently used to double-down on a successful first kick and expose a depleted back three with a second one.

The addition of Henry Slade into England’s midfield not only provides another kicking option, but also a ball-hawking centre who provides high-pressure defence.

This has created more turnovers from which to create kick-chase opportunities from.

Flying off the line, Slade targets a robotic Lopez going through the motions to jump the passing lane and snatch the pass.

He takes as much of the open field as he can before being at risk of being cut down by French wing Gael Fickou. Again we see the preference for a foot race as Slade puts in a grubber for the supporting Chris Ashton (14).

Chris Ashton is tackled by Fickou without the ball, resulting in a penalty try to England and a yellow card to France.

Against Wales, these fast break scenarios were limited but it was Slade to spark one in the first half with this charge down and re-gather on Gareth Anscombe.

Slade is brought down by Anscombe before getting the ball away to Jonny May who is also chopped down on the edge of the 22.

With Wales scrambling, Youngs and Farrell call a pet-play which calls for a halfback dink end-over-end over the top and a chase from the 10, who can use the base of the ruck as the offside line to really wind up his run.

Wales’ fullback Liam Williams senses almost immediately that his side’s backfield coverage is compromised and bails on the ‘A’ pillar role to make sure this play can’t happen.

He gets a headstart on Farrell and manages to collect the loose ball in what would otherwise have been a race won by the England flyhalf.

Against the likes of Wales and Ireland, England found it more difficult to profit from transition plays as the windows were smaller and the defence generally more aware, although they still came away with two tries from kicks and one from an intercept in Dublin.

Scotland and France gave up an untold amount of opportunities from these situations and conceded frequently.

With Argentina being a helter-skelter type of side like France that can blow hot and cold and offer disorganised defence, England will likely find success with their kick-chase game off counter-attacking situations to knock over their two big pool opponents.

If a quarterfinal presents against the Wallabies, another error-prone side which they have had no problems dispatching since the last World Cup, a semi-final appearance is likely.

Where the All Blacks use catch-pass to kill teams on counter-attack, England use kick-chase off it and in 2019 have found success with it bringing in Slade and moving Daly to fullback.

By re-booting their counter-attacking game, England are ready to make amends for a pool stage exit in 2015 at this year’s Rugby World Cup.

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j
john 4 minutes ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

But here in Australia we were told Penney was another gun kiwi coach, for the Tahs…….and yet again it turned out the kiwi coach was completely useless. Another con job on Australian rugby. As was Robbie Deans, as was Dave Rennie. Both coaches dumped from NZ and promoted to Australia as our saviour. And the Tahs lap them up knowing they are second rate and knowing that under pressure when their short comings are exposed in Australia as well, that they will fall in below the largest most powerful province and choose second rate Tah players to save their jobs. As they do and exactly as Joe Schmidt will do. Gauranteed. Schmidt was dumped by NZ too. That’s why he went overseas. That why kiwi coaches take jobs in Australia, to try and prove they are not as bad as NZ thought they were. Then when they get found out they try and ingratiate themselves to NZ again by dragging Australian teams down with ridiculous selections and game plans. NZ rugby’s biggest problem is that it can’t yet transition from MCaw Cheatism. They just don’t know how to try and win on your merits. It is still always a contest to see how much cheating you can get away with. Without a cheating genius like McCaw, they are struggling. This I think is why my wise old mate in NZ thinks Robertson will struggle. The Crusaders are the nursery of McCaw Cheatism. Sean Fitzpatrick was probably the father of it. Robertson doesn’t know anything else but other countries have worked it out.

13 Go to comments
A
Adrian 1 hours ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

Thanks Nick The loss of players to OS, injury and retirement is certainly not helping the Crusaders. Ditto the coach. IMO Penny is there to hold the fort and cop the flak until new players and a new coach come through,…and that's understood and accepted by Penny and the Crusaders hierarchy. I think though that what is happening with the Crusaders is an indicator of what is happening with the other NZ SRP teams…..and the other SRP teams for that matter. Not enough money. The money has come via the SR competition and it’s not there anymore. It's in France, Japan and England. Unless or until something is done to make SR more SELLABLE to the NZ/Australia Rugby market AND the world rugby market the $s to keep both the very best players and the next rung down won't be there. They will play away from NZ more and more. I think though that NZ will continue to produce the players and the coaches of sufficient strength for NZ to have the capacity to stay at the top. Whether they do stay at the top as an international team will depend upon whether the money flowing to SRP is somehow restored, or NZ teams play in the Japan comp, or NZ opts to pick from anywhere. As a follower of many sports I’d have to say that the organisation and promotion of Super Rugby has been for the last 20 years closest to the worst I’ve ever seen. This hasn't necessarily been caused by NZ, but it’s happened. Perhaps it can be fixed, perhaps not. The Crusaders are I think a symptom of this, not the cause

13 Go to comments
T
Trevor 4 hours ago
Will forgotten Wallabies fit the Joe Schmidt model?

Thanks Brett.. At last a positive article on the potential of Wallaby candidates, great to read. Schmidt’s record as an international rugby coach speaks for itself, I’m somewhat confident he will turn the Wallaby’s fortunes around …. on the field. It will be up to others to steady the ship off the paddock. But is there a flaw in my optimism? We have known all along that Australia has the players to be very competitive with their international rivals. We know that because everyone keeps telling us. So why the poor results? A question that requires a definitive answer before the turn around can occur. Joe Schmidt signed on for 2 years, time to encompass the Lions tour of 2025. By all accounts he puts family first and that’s fair enough, but I would wager that his 2 year contract will be extended if the next 18 months or so shows the statement “Australia has the players” proves to be correct. The new coach does not have a lot of time to meld together an outfit that will be competitive in the Rugby Championship - it will be interesting to see what happens. It will be interesting to see what happens with Giteau law, the new Wallaby coach has already verbalised that he would to prefer to select from those who play their rugby in Australia. His first test in charge is in July just over 3 months away .. not a long time. I for one wish him well .. heaven knows Australia needs some positive vibes.

21 Go to comments
B
Bull Shark 8 hours ago
Jake White: Are modern rugby players actually better?

Of the rugby I’ve born witness to in my lifetime - 1990 to date - I recognize great players throughout those years. But I have no doubt the game and the players are on average better today. So I doubt going back further is going to prove me wrong. The technical components of the game, set pieces, scrums, kicks, kicks at goal. And in general tactics employed are far more efficient, accurate and polished. Professional athletes that have invested countless hours on being accurate. There is one nation though that may be fairly competitive in any era - and that for me is the all blacks. And New Zealand players in general. NZ produces startling athletes who have fantastic ball skills. And then the odd phenomenon like Brooke. Lomu. Mcaw. Carter. Better than comparing players and teams across eras - I’ve often had this thought - that it would be very interesting to have a version of the game that is closer to its original form. What would the game look like today if the rules were rolled back. Not rules that promote safety obviously - but rules like: - a try being worth 1 point and conversion 2 points. Hence the term “try”. Earning a try at goals. Would we see more attacking play? - no lifting in the lineouts. - rucks and break down laws in general. They looked like wrestling matches in bygone eras. I wonder what a game applying 1995 rules would look like with modern players. It may be a daft exercise, but it would make for an interesting spectacle celebrating “purer” forms of the game that roll back the rules dramatically by a few versions. Would we come to learn that some of the rules/combinations of the rules we see today have actually made the game less attractive? I’d love to see an exhibition match like that.

29 Go to comments
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