'We came here with a goal... be the first Samoa team to beat England'

England entered their match against Samoa in Lille on Saturday knowing they were Pool D winners, but they looked anything but that, as Steve Borthwick will be all too aware that his side were one unsuccessful diving tackle from Danny Care away from yet more ignominy.

The margins were so fine that had the climactic conditions been the same as they were in England’s opening two matches of the World Cup in Marseille, the troublesome humidity might have allowed Neria Fomai’s right leg to slip through the clutches of the scrum-half, and England would have suffered their second ‘first ever loss’ in the space of six weeks.

Given the events of the last couple of months, chiefly England’s historic loss to Fiji at Twickenham, any side facing them will feel they are ripe for the taking at the moment, and that is why it was so hard for the Samoan players to hide their disappointment after the match.

Behind a positive outlook was a genuine sense of regret amongst the players that a chance to beat England went begging, and it would have been a victory that was richly deserved. Samoa dominated the middle two quarters of the match and it was only a slight lapse in discipline in the final stages that allowed their opponents to sneak a 18-17 victory.

Seilala Mapusua’s men arrived at the Stade Pierre-Mauroy with the aim of winning, and they played like a team that fully expected to despite a lopsided history against Owen Farrell’s side. Given their intentions pre-match and how they performed, winger Nigel Ah Wong made it quite clear how the team were feeling.

“The boys and the team are very disappointed,” the 33-year-old said. “We came here with a goal tonight to make history, to be the first Samoa team to the beat England.

“We let ourselves down and that’s probably a common theme with the last few games. A lot of discipline and handling errors, but I thought our handling today was much better. It was just probably our discipline that let us down today, so the boys are very disappointed.”

The result should not detract from some standout performances from the Samoan squad, particularly Ah Wong himself, who not only scored twice, but produced a contender for the try of the World Cup when he was able to catch Lima Sopoaga’s cross-field kick at full tilt behind the try line and still manage to dot the ball down before going out. After missing the loss to Japan, the former Blues winger came back into the starting XV to torment England down the right flank as Samoa played with a fluidity that had not been seen at the World Cup before then.

Ah Wong outlined some of those changes that were seen in Lille that were not seen in losses to Argentina and Japan.

“We were able to get the ball to the areas we wanted to that we’ve been working on hard the last few weeks,” he said. “We’ve struggled to get the ball out to the edge over the past few weeks and today we managed to string a few phases together, hold on to the ball, which allowed us to find some space down down the edges. That was probably the big difference from the previous games.”

Perhaps the greatest regret for Samoa might lie in the fact that had they performed against their other opponents in the way they did against England, they might not be leaving the World Cup so early. In a pool where the eponymous D could easily be a grading for some of the performances from the teams that comprise it, Samoa will know that if all their performances were at the same level as their final match, they probably would have done enough to make the quarter-finals. That is probably why they say the saddest phrase utterable is ‘it might have been’.

But it was not as though Samoa simply decided to flick a switch before their final match, as hooker Sama Malolo emphasised, rather it was a case of the team gelling as the World Cup progressed following some limited playing time before heading to France.

Malolo said that the result “hurts”, but he is proud of the strides the side have made over the last month particularly when compared to the lack of preparation his side has had compared to the likes of England.

“Samoa as a team we haven’t played many games this year, we don’t get much time to build our cohesiveness as a team and it’s taken us to our last game of the Rugby World Cup to finally get there. We don’t get that privilege like the tier one nations do, to play multiple games throughout the year.

“Whatever happens, I’m proud of the boys and I just hope that we can stay together as a team moving forward and get some more Test matches for our country.”