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England's Red Roses smash attendance record to clinch Grand Slam

By PA
Marlie Packer celebrates - PA

England completed the Grand Slam with a 38-33 victory over France but were saved by the bell in front of a world record 58,498 crowd at Twickenham.

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Initially rising to the occasion of setting a new highest attendance for the women’s game, surpassing the 42,579 seen for last autumn’s World Cup final in Auckland, the Red Roses ran amok to build a 33-0 interval lead.

A fifth successive TikTok Women’s Six Nations looked certain but France were reborn for a second half they dominated 33-5 only to run out of time as England collapsed in dramatic fashion.

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It remained a triumphant send-off for outgoing England head coach Simon Middleton with the strongest rivalry in the Championship producing another compelling instalment.

France were the last side to beat England in the Six Nations five years ago and they started the game like they finished it, although without the rewards.

It took resolute defending including an important penalty won on the ground by Hannah Botterman to deny them early on, but the pressure was halted when England pounced against the run of play.

Red Roses Grand Slam

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Footwork and power swept Helena Rowland through the midfield before quick ball gave Abby Dow sight of the line with the right wing’s pace doing the rest.

Rowland’s centre partner Tatyana Heard was the next to swat away blue shirts and when she was eventually halted, Marlie Packer used her strength to crash over.

France’s defence was creaking and fly-half Jessy Tremouliere was shown a yellow card for a deliberate knock-on, ushering in a damaging spell that saw Alex Matthews cross and a penalty try awarded against Rose Bernadou.

Bernadou followed Tremouliere into the sin-bin and England continued to canter seemingly out of sight as Zoe Aldcroft touched down.

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However, having regrouped at half-time, France full-back Emilie Boulard went over in the 48th minute through slick attacking play and when Gabrielle Vernier produced a smart dummy and sidestep before speeding over, the Red Roses’ nerves began to fray.

They settled when Lark Davies dived over once England’s pack had reasserted itself but the visitors continued to fight with tries by Charlotte Escudero, Emeline Gros and Cyrielle Banet falling narrowly short of the target needed.

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Nickers 51 minutes ago
Scott Robertson names his 35-man All Blacks squad for France series

As always with Razor slightly unorthodox with a few surprises. Last year Blackadder was rushed back into the starting 15 after a long injury lay off and no game time, this year on the back of a good body of work in which he was immense in the final he doesn’t even make the squad. But Finau, who possibly wouldn’t have even been starting for the Chiefs if Parker was fit is the only specialist 6 in the squad. Likewise Havili, great season and a great final, much better than last year by all measures but doesn’t make the cut.


6 mid fielders when 4 will do, but only 5 loosies when 7 would be useful -> Maybe Lakai and Parker come in? No 3rd choice at 10 meaning if one of BB or DMac sustain a mid to long term injury there is no one they are specifically trusting to come into the team and be able to close out matches - maybe they think Love is the 3rd best 10 in NZ?


Great to see Tavatavanawai straight in on the back of a huge season - he should 100% be in the 23. There have been players before like Stevenson or Sotutu who had the season of the their lives and didn’t get picked, so this is great and a little surprising to see.


Only 4 locks and no lock cover among the loosies named. This seems like an area we need to be developing more players rather than concentrating the talent pool down further. Maybe when Darry is fit he finds his way back in, but it would be good to see Lord or whoever the 6th best lock is around the squad too.


One thing I continue to find strange about ABs selection going back many years is that they are obsessed with backs being able to cover multiple positions, but they don’t take advantage of this in any way. The fact that we have 3 players who can play 12, and 3 that can play 13, doesn’t stop them from selecting ALB to cover 12 and 13 giving them 4 options at each position - what is the point of this? Likewise Love, I really like him, especially at 10, But they have Jordan, BB, Dmac who all play 15 at test level, as well as JB who is world class at 15 to cover, so why take up another spot in the squad with yet another 15? Why do we need four options for every position in the backs except 10, which is arguably the most important one where we have not been able to develop a new test player for 8 or 9 years.


And unless there is a big change this year they also don’t use all these utility backs to enable a 6-2 bench split, and will instead pick a specialist winger on the bench to come on and play the last 10 minutes.

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