Why Faith in England Will Be Rock Bottom After Autumn Internationals

The curtain is about to go up on England’s final dress rehearsal with the Southern Hemisphere big guns before next year’s World Cup.

In under a year’s time, they will be battling for real against the best in the world to lift the Webb Ellis Cup.

The coming four weeks represent their last chance to benchmark themselves against the best in the world.

But how much does it actually matter?

In an interview with BBC.co.uk this week, retired Ireland legend Brian O’Driscoll made the point that beating these teams outside of the World Cup doesn’t make for a sign of greatness.

He evidenced Ireland’s last World Cup campaign, in which they beat Australia to win their group and went out in the next round with defeat to Wales, which made beating one of the world’s traditional powerhouses futile for that group of Irish players.

Here is where O’Driscoll and English philosophy part ways.

English rugby is still in thrall to that glorious year of 2003. Not just the World Cup win, which was essentially secured by a team just about to teeter over the highest point of its upward trajectory and come crashing down to earth, but because of what happened earlier that year.

Their summer tour before the World Cup took them to New Zealand and Australia for one-off tests against both countries.

In a rain-soaked Wellington, Martin Johnson’s men throttled the far-more talented All Blacks. Jonny Wilkinson kicked his goals, an English six-man scrum held firm and history was made.

A week later they swaggered into Melbourne and blew Australia away with an altogether different brand of rugby.

Tries were scored by free-running backs, the forwards drove rolling mauls upfield as though the Australian pack was nought but an empty shopping trolley and Josh Lewsey put in the kind of hit on Mat Rogers that will populate greatest tackle compilations on the internet for another decade to come.

Those two, distinct performances completed the puzzle for England’s players and fans. They knew then, before they entered the tournament, that they could beat anyone in any conditions.

That is what they are looking for again, now, as they tackle the big three—and Samoa—over the next four weekends, confirmation that this group is ready to do the same, come what may.

But they will not emerge with that same, unshaken belief, because they will not come out with four wins.

Here is why.

In 2003, New Zealand were a team with obvious frailties. They had a liability at No. 10 in the shape of Carlos Spencer.

Their pack was not dominant, and they lacked as many genuinely once-in-a-generation stars as this current crop.

They come to England having evolved since last year and having swollen their roster of talent.

Defeat in South Africa, despite a rousing performance from the Boks, was only sealed with a last–gasp swing of shoe leather.

And in Brisbane they got out of jail through sheer persistence and a maintenance of their outrageous skill levels right to the last.

They are better for those experiences, and they are also better for their three-match series with England in the summer.

Then, they almost got caught cold. That will not happen at Twickenham.

England will get off to a losing start and receive a reminder of the gulf between them and the very best.

If the Springboks have been able to metaphorically bottle the passion and intensity they produced against New Zealand in Johannesburg, they will beat everyone on this tour.

The key to that win was their intensity at the breakdown.

Duane Vermeulen and his back row colleagues simply out-fought the All Blacks, and when they gave their backs front-foot ball, they had a fly-half ready and willing to use it in Handre Pollard.

It is hard to see England outmuscling the South Africa team and even harder to see them winning the ground game without a specialist mongrel at No. 7.

Defeat to South Africa awaits.

Stuart Lancaster still has question marks over his best line-up.

Not so much in the forwards but in the backs, where injuries have denied him the consistency of selection he would crave this close to a World Cup.

This set of fixtures sees a fourth different centre combination get a run out in Brad Barritt and Kyle Eastmond, as injuries to Manu Tuilagi and Luther Burrell scupper preparations.

You also get the sense that the jury is out on who to play on either wing.

Semesa Rokoduguni gets his chance, while Jonny May is back in the side. Throw Jack Nowell, Marland Yarde and Christian Wade into the mix and you feel Lancaster is still waiting for two from that list to really grasp the nettle.

Then there is the great hope from rugby league. Are we all just waiting for Sam Burgess to ride into town and—if not save English rugby, for it is not in the doldrums—propel this team to new heights?

It is likely that these question marks will not be extinguished by the time we have started opening our Advent calendars, and for that reason, there can be no genuinely-held belief that the Red Rose is set to bloom in 2015.