England must unleash 'frightening' backline v Australia, Ireland 'licking lips' for New Zealand - Danny Care column

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England narrowly failed to begin their Autumn Nations Series campaign with a win last weekend, and Danny Care - in his latest column for TNT Sports - believes that Steve Borthwick's side must sort out their set-piece for their meeting with Australia at Allianz Stadium, Twickenham this weekend. Meanwhile, Care believes Ireland will be "licking their lips" ahead of welcoming New Zealand to Dublin.

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Ex-England scrum-half Danny Care will be providing insight and analysis for TNT Sports throughout the 2024 Autumn Nations Series. Here is his second column ahead of a huge weekend, featuring England v Australia and Ireland v New Zealand - both live on TNT Sports and discovery+

England MUST FIX set-piece

Discipline is one of the areas England need to improve this weekend against Australia. I also think they’ve got to sort out their set-piece a little bit, especially at the back-end of games.

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The dominant England sides of the past didn't give you anything set-piece wise; you had parity if not dominance. So - knowing Steve Borthwick - that’s something that I’m sure England will have worked very hard on this week, to make sure they’re not giving away any penalties at scrum-time to give teams easy ways of alleviating pressure.

I’d probably like to see England be a little bit braver with the ball too, move the ball a little bit more, move the ball to the dangerous players that they’ve got. That backline is frightening, but I didn’t think we really saw it get going last weekend.

I think a part of that was the fact that New Zealand kept giving away penalties and dropping the ball. So when that’s happening in a game, you go ‘oh ok, that’s the type of game it is, let’s just get up into their area of the field, they’re going to give away penalties, they’re going to give us opportunities to kick at goal,' so England didn’t really need to take many risks by throwing the ball around and maybe forcing things. They kind of just stayed in the game to give themselves an opportunity to win it.

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Whereas this week, I hope that they go ‘right, we’re going to be the aggressors, we’re going to take it to Australia, we’re going to show what we’re all about, we’re going to attack’.

They’ve got 80 minutes under their belt against one of the best teams, they’re up against Australia at home, a team that’s struggled recently – I’d like to see England have a real go this weekend and really try and get ahead on the scoreboard.

Smith, Smith or Ford?

The fly-half area is a really tricky one at the moment, because England have got three brilliant ones. Steve’s almost suffering from having too many options, because you have to leave one of them out of the matchday 23.

I’ve said it before, Marcus Smith is the one that has to start. You have to give him the most amount of minutes on the pitch. I think he’s one of England’s very best players at the minute.

With George Ford, it’s very hard to look past 97 caps, all that experience. There isn’t an awful lot of experience in that squad - in the backline especially - apart from George and Henry Slade. Marcus is probably next up, so you can understand why Steve wants to have George in there.

But if you’re Fin Smith, you’re probably sat there going ‘Steve, did you see what I was doing last year for Northampton?’ But it’s a really tough one, all three of them can’t play.

At the moment, it’s Marcus starting with George on the bench. Fin’s going to play a lot more times for England in his career, it’s just at the moment I think Steve probably preferring the other two tactically.

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Feyi-Waboso, Cunningham-South show the future

Manny Feyi-Waboso and Chandler Cunningham-South are settling into Test match rugby perfectly. They look completely at ease and comfortable.

What I admire about them in particular is that they just look so confident with it. They want the ball all the time, Chandler wants to go and hit people hard, in defence he wants to make an impact, he wants to gee up the crowd, he wants to be that sort of hype guy, which is amazing. Fans love that. They saw the big hit against New Zealand that came up on the screen loads, you could hear the stadium going mad, it was brilliant.

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And Manny possesses that rare gift where he can make things happen that other people can’t – that’s what I’d like to see, him getting the ball more often, with a bit of space.

Also, I don’t think we really got to see much of Tommy Freeman last weekend, so I’m hoping this weekend they will get a bit more ball, with more opportunities to get the ball to space, and we see our dangerous players light up the pitch.

Ireland licking lips ahead of seismic All Blacks clash

If you’re an Irish fan, player or coach at the minute, you’ll be licking your lips with New Zealand coming on Friday night to their home, on a six-day turnaround after a really physical Test match with England.

This is a great opportunity for Ireland. They would have been licking their lips without that short turnaround anyway, but I think even more so now, with Codie Taylor and Beauden Barrett out of the 23 with HIA protocols, two of their world-class players not available for selection.

Coming to Ireland’s home, with the history and everything that went on in the 2023 World Cup (Ireland lost narrowly in a brutal quarter-final), it’s tailor-made for a really good Irish performance. I’d definitely put them as favourites for Friday night.

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But New Zealand will love to go there as underdogs, they’ll love that tag – they don’t get it very often. I think they’ll still be incredibly dangerous. I imagine Damian McKenzie will come back into the 10 shirt. He is not a bad replacement for Barrett.

The Irish I’m sure will be hatching a plan, and if I know Andy Farrell like I think I do, I think he’ll be desperate for Friday night to come. I’m so jealous of anyone that’s got a ticket for that game because I think it’s going to be spectacular. I can’t wait to watch it.

Stream the Autumn Nations Series live on TNT Sports and discovery+

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