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The England tactic enraging rugby fans online after Scotland match
By Ian Cameron
England’s 16-15 victory over Scotland in the Calcutta Cup has failed to appease a sizeable portion of rugby fans, who took to social media to voice their frustrations regarding head coach Steve Borthwick’s tactics.
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Despite securing a narrow win at Twickenham, many fans described England’s persistent reliance on the boot – from box kicks to tactical punts – as ineffective, poorly executed and above all, incredibly boring.
England’s kicking strategy repeatedly handed Scotland possession, enabling the visitors to counter with dangerous strike runners. Several posts on social media pointed out the apparent lack of a cohesive chase, which meant that many kicks merely relieved pressure, rather than creating attacking opportunities for England.
But it was the sheer repetitiveness of the kicking that sapped the souls of many England rugby fans.
Former England fly-half Andy Goode wrote: “England are just playing one phase then kick it, we need to be more threatening ball in hand attack more”.
Not only was it boring, it failed to utilise the attacking talent of Marcus Smith, Ollie Lawrence, Ollie Sleightholme and Tommy Freeman.
Ben Bradford wrote on X: “Scotland have been excellent, but this English gameplan is baffling. When we do string a few phases together we look dangerous and break the line… The Borthwick kicking strategy is stifling these players.”
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G Pedliham spewed: “The box kicking is not a strategy that’s working. Borthwick doesn’t have the wit to change it,” while DFMack similarly mused “The Borthwick box-kickers… only one team playing rugby here”
Another poster asked for Borthwick: “Yet again England underperform against Scotland. If we lose this, Borthwick has to be sacked next week. There’s absolutely no progress being made under his regime.”
Another frustrated fan cheekily quipped: “Borthwick will be RAGING with Marcus Smith over that last play because he didn’t aimlessly kick the ball away as per the 2-year game plan.”
Garvin Barwell queried what the players must make of the tactics: “These England players must hate playing for Borthwick. Zero ambition to play with the ball in hand.”
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Another not so happy customer offerd: “England rugby has to the most boring, one dimensional side I’ve ever seen. Kick kick kick. Then they eek out a point victory. Something has to be done work the rules. It simply cannot be that you can be so negative and successful. There is zero incentive to play rugby.”
And it wasn’t just England fans. On RTE Former Ireland No.8 Jamie Heaslip described England’s gameplan as ‘Really boring… just kicking the leather off it’, while fellow Ireland back-rower Stephen Ferris queried whether Steve Borthwick is the man to progress this team.
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Teams kick because its the best option.
Why did England kick so much? Because they had no better options a lot of the time. Why had they no better options? Excellent Scottish kicking, chasing, spoiling in ruck and defense and attack. Scotland learning from Ireland kicking on the front foot, meaning the England catcher gets swamped and they are forced into another poor box-kick.
Despite a dire spectacle it always felt like England would stumble over the line.
I must be totally honest here when I say it must be aweful to be an England Test player. The reason is simple. When England lose the coach must go, when they win, the coach must go. They just only lost to Ireland and beat France and Scotland but all the comments are about boring rugby. Apart from England, who gives a crap if their own teams wins ugly. England need the ugly wins (excl. France) to build a positive scoreboard momentum. You want to win and play the best rugby on the planet at the same time. Talk about having your cake and eating it. Be grateful for once that your team is winning because the beer tastes better no matter the spectacle if you are in the right side of the scoreboard!!!
I am all for the idea of protecting the scrum half but this box kicking is just down right boring. In Mitchell’s case it was pick up ball and box kick time and time again. We have a great talent with Ollie Larewnce and Henry Slade and the superb talents of Finn and Marcus Smith but these lads are not be used to their abilities as Alex doesn’t want to give them good ball. It’s one directional and now scrum halves are being protected makes his game even more ponderous and one directional giving the opposition plenty of time to eye up his plan of attack .. if ever there was one.
As Bod said how can someone who plays so well for his Club be so bad when he puts on an England Shirt.
Time to watch the great Faf de Klerk Joost van de vesterheizen George Greegan Aaron Smith Peter Skinner James Gibson Park et al and maybe you will see what scrum halves should do in keeping the game going forward. Sorry Alex time to go along with your coach
There is another scrummie by the name of DuPont who is also quite good. In fact today he passed more than Mitchell has in the whole competition thus far!
Mitchell is by far the best scrumhalf in the country. He's just following orders. The blame lies with Wigglesworth and Borthwick.
Scotland blew that game through a lack of composure. They were all over England for long periods and couldn’t get out of their own way.
England’s tactic of putting in a great carry then slowing everything down to do a box kick is inexplicable. Kicking on first phase while going forward isn’t a terrible idea - it generally means you put in a good chase and turn it into an attacking situation, but to put the handbrake on while you’re going forward so that you can do a box kick is crazy.
It’s like they weren’t expecting to ever have front foot ball to the point of not even being able to recognise it.
It’s a shame for England fans that they pulled off the last 2 games, otherwise Borthwick would have been going the same way as Gatland. As it is the team stays on life support for another year.
Totally agree Nickers. We've just papered over the cracks for another year.
Regarding the box kicking, as you’ve implied, the majority of the time we go to it, it's the correct option… but it's so prescribed and overdone that we're missing opportunities to attack and build pressure through multiphase rugby. There are so many times we kick it and I think to myself “every other international team in world rugby keeps it in hand here, what the actual f*ck are we doing?”. It's groundhog day. To their credit they've scraped two lucky, home wins against better opposition due to determination, physicality and breakdown prowess but England are not a good side. The main difference between Borthwick and Gatland is Borthwick has a lot of good players doing their best to keep him employed.
Ireland do it, France does it and so does Scotland. A dangerous attacking back three with power and good off-loading skills. All big, strong and fast players. Oh and a no 10 and centres to feed them. This is the current disrupting tactic that gives teams the edge. England need to cotton on to that, or be resigned to the fate of also rans.
It is now patently obvious the this team is showing zero progress under Borthwick, their is no guile or inventiveness in their attack at all, the box kicking today was vacuous and without rhyme nor reason.
I agree the constant kicking was infuriating, but also so was Borthwick’s whole game management: it was clear that Scotland were getting the best of the back row battle and that Tom Curry had an injury and was ineffective, yet he kept him on until half time - why not give Ted Hill a go earlier, as soon as Curry was injured? Also Daley has driven me crazy for years by kicking out in the full in every game and he did it again here with his only kick and that led to a lady ten minutes of pressure from Scotland - they also ran exactly the same moves with Daly as they did with France - why?? Do they think the Scots don’t have TV’s? Also they repeatedly tried kicking to Freeman which didn’t work either. No variety of attack at all. Also it was definitely not the moment to bring in Randall, who immediately fluffed a box kick, as usual. Ben Spencer could have offered something different, though he is so badly treated by England he never plays with confidence for them. The most infuriating win from England I have seen in ages. Borthwick at his most mechanical and robotic.
England have struggled at the end of games. He wanted to keep Ted Hill fresh to bring big impact in the last 8 seconds.
The go-to box kick in this game was incredibly over-used. I though Scotland also over-used it. What has happened to the chip kick, grubber, wipers variation kicking game? Scotland was much better at countering off the box kick reception with some excellent interplays and except for poor conversion kicking by FR, would have won. Again, only the close nature of the contest makes this rugby watchable for a neutral.
Glad I wasn’t the only one fed up. Complete waste of the talent we have.
England under Direwick have absolutely no identity. They’ve had 2-weeks together and that’s the best they can come up with? Jeez.
Box kick. Box kick. Box kick.
Yeah they won, but only because Scotland/Russell fluffed it.
“but only because Scotland/Russell fluffed it.”
It would appear the referee may have also played a significant part in that final kick.
Check out Jamie Roberts’ Twitter account. He’s posted footage of the build up to it. Russell is putting the ball on the tee, only for the referee to prevent him from taking it in line with where the try was scored. He forces him to restart several metres further out, with a more acute angle and by that point less time on the shot clock!
What do you expect from a coach who’s primary tactic is copying the game plans of winning teams from 6 or more years ago.
I hear he’s got his hands on some footage from the 90’s. God help us.
All Borthwick and Wigglesworth did in their playing days was box kick and maul and they were very successful with it. It's absolutely no surprise to me that is the only way they want to play. They spent their entire careers being woefully unimaginative and conservative. What does surprise me is how dogmatically they stick to this strategy after it's been so unsuccessful. Especially when Ollie Lawrence looks so dangerous ball in hand and they pick Marcus Smith at fullback. Let's pick a tiny flyhalf to play fullback, never pass him the ball and let him spend the whole game trying to field bombs. Masterstroke!
Borethick
ppl don’t know what they’re talking about
Borthwick’s tactics are great