LONG READ Mick Cleary: 'England need to set a target. They need to win the 2026 Six Nations Championship.'

If Steve Borthwick, who is in as strong a position as he’s ever been as England coach, is to make progress in his quest for World Cup glory in 20 months, then first he has to look after events closer to home, and none is bigger than the Six Nations Championship. England are well-placed and a first Grand Slam in a decade is not beyond them if they get the key decisions right.

1 – The Extra 1%

Friday’s Six Nations squad announcement might appear to be a straightforward affair. A few names make the cut, others miss out, injury updates given and on England go, headed towards the 2026 Championship with prospects of continuing their fine form of last year all to the good. Well, if they are cruising across the water in composed fashion, then you can only hope that they are paddling furiously beneath the surface. There is still so much for Steve Borthwick to do. There is still so much for the team to do, too. Winning silverware wouldn’t be a bad start. If England think they have cracked it after 11 successive victories, after a first win over the All Blacks in six years (admittedly not the prized scalp it once was), then they are doomed. Friday’s venue for the Six Nations squad announcement, the Allianz Stadium, may be built on solid foundations but England’s success is not. Not yet.

The next six months represent the single most important period of Borthwick’s reign. If he gets it right then England can lay legitimate claim to being one of the serious contenders for World Cup honours in Australia. If Borthwick botches it, if the team falters, then England are back in the pack. England, admittedly, have done so much right. Last season’s championship – tick. Tour to Argentina – big tick. Autumn series – big tick, a first four-match clean sweep in nine years. But if they rest on those laurels then there is no guarantee of progression. Complacency nobbles even the good teams. But it rarely compromises the very best, such as the All Blacks of a decade ago or the current Springboks. It’s about locating that extra 1%, that bit of performance that you probably didn’t even know you needed or were aware of. It could be fitness, skill, mindset or teamship or whatever. Clive Woodward’s team went in pursuit of it. And it worked.

2 – Set a Target

Coaches hate nailing their colours to the mast, avoid laying down precise goals in terms of winning silverware. For them, it’s all about performance, improving against this or that metric that they scrutinise until their eyeballs burn. Well, this time it’s simple. England need to win the 2026 Six Nations Championship. That’s not to say they will win it or that they should win it. That’s to debunk the usual tiresome English arrogance trope. But you can’t hide away from the realities of what this next 18 months is all about – it’s about getting in shape for a tilt at the Webb Ellis Trophy. England have a track-record of near-misses – beaten semi-finalists in 2023 and runners-up four years earlier in Japan. Decent but not good enough. It’s about closing out the deal, no matter how. France took a mighty fall on home soil, similarly Ireland. Sure, the draw might have been a Beacher’s Brook hurdle put in front of them. But history, quite rightly, ignores the caveats. Winner on the podium, the rest crying in their beer in the dressing-room. So targets matter. If you don’t have the habit of winning the big moments then the big moment will always pass you by.

3 – The Murrayfield Test

We shall know soon enough if the Borthwick master plan has legs. England will make all the right competitive noises about facing Wales first up at Twickenham on February 7^th. And, yes, there is a sliver of possibility out there somewhere in the sporting universe, a Buster Douglas knockout of Mike Tyson or 100-1 Foinavon winning the Grand National. Much as Welsh fans would love to resurrect the late Clive Rowlands era of Red Dragon supremacy. The one-time Welsh supremo was once asked what Wales would do now that they had been knocked out of the 1987 World Cup, replying: ‘Go back to beating England I suppose’.

The tide has turned to the extent that Welsh rugby is drowning, no longer even just waving for help. But Murrayfield on the second weekend is something else entirely. Scottish rugby is on a high. Or, rather, Glasgow rugby is. The Warriors are on fire – top of their European pool with an unblemished record into the Round of 16, battle-hardened, hard-nosed, pragmatic, winners. Just the sort of thing that England aspire to be. Victory on the road is the blue-riband achievement. An early goal for England to meet. Flunk and doubts will re-surface.

4 – The French Question

Borthwick must keep the conversation channels open to get the Willis brothers, Jack and Tom, on the roster for RWC 2027. It’s a forlorn hope and you might argue that Tom has made his own choice to head to Bordeaux but if you agree with the extra 1% principle, then it is a no-brainer. They are worth the effort.

5 – Selection Issues

Borthwick has taken time to settle into the groove but he has persevered and looks now to have options in all the key areas, except perhaps hooker. Injury problems are the bane of a manager’s life in football or rugby and Borthwick has the usual raft of difficulties, notably at prop where Will Stuart and Asher Opoku-Fordjour are crook and Fin Baxter is a doubt. That’s par for the course. England can’t bellyache as they have a deeper pool of players than anyone bar France. What has opened up for Borthwick is the talent available in midfield and the back three. Of course there is the perennial debate as to who the starting No.10 should be but as long as George Ford is fit and firing then he should have the shirt. Until he wobbles, the two Smiths, Fin and Marcus, must bide their time. One thing that has to be ruled out once and for all is that Marcus Smith is an auxiliary full-back. Smith is not a No.15 and it’s a ruinous strategy to persist with him coming off the bench in that role.

The centre pairing is designed to give Borthwick a headache of the right kind – challenging rather than vexing. There are plenty of considerations. Tommy Freeman at outside centre does not hold as much appeal as once it did for the simple reason that England now have a raft of inside centres. If Freeman wore No.13 then Ollie Lawrence would have to switch inside. Instead a combo of either Fraser Dingwall, Seb Atkinson or, the hot runner coming up on the rails, Max Ojomoh, should be paired with Lawrence. Immanuel Feyi-Waboso on one wing with Freeman on the other will give England strike power. It is not the fastest but it is impactful.