In his BBC Sport column, World Cup winner Matt Dawson reflects on England’s thumping Six Nations victory over Italy, and assesses the final day title race.
This England team haven’t had much practice of being in the position of dominance they had over Italy.
They scored 47 points with seven very good tries and showed some great attacking ‘intent’, a word they used a lot in the post-match interviews.
The victory will be a good experience for the players, and for 60 minutes they can be very pleased with themselves.
But some of them may be reflecting on the last 20 and know they could have done a bit more.
I found myself getting frustrated when I was commentating. I don’t know whether that is because my expectations of this England side are so high because of the talent in the squad, but we didn’t do it for longer periods of time.
We scored a brilliant first try and then had a lapse of concentration and Italy score back. We score another try and then they hit back again.
It felt like England always had Italy at arms length and it wasn’t ‘are England going to win this?’ It was by how many?
But then my expectation was of more accuracy and discipline in how England were going to play. Dotted in amongst all of that there were some brilliant moments.
I think there was more cohesion in a backline, which included five Northampton Saints players. I loved the first five minutes where Ollie Lawrence and Elliot Daly synced into the Saints way really well.
Daly set the tone at full-back and you could feel the way they were trying to play and Italy were not going to survive.
The changes they had to make because of Lawrence’s injury took the wind our their sails a bit. They regrouped at half time and had a good 10 minutes to put the game away, but then they just sort of, shut up shop.
Twickenham felt a bit flat and I think that was reflected in how England played in the last 20 minutes. I remember Ollie Chessum making a break from a line-out and then we slow it down and go to the box kick.
Four phases of that intensity and England stroll in somewhere for another try, like they did in the first half and like the top teams do. It was a feeling of, we have done enough to win the game, lets lock it up and not give anything away.
They had an Italy side on the ropes, lacking in motivation after their pumping by France, before giving the likes of Juan Ignacio Brex, Tommaso Menoncello and some proud Italian players a bit of life to not make it difficult, but a bit awkward.
England had an opportunity to grab them by the scruff of the neck and make it all about them.
You can see what that type of total dominance against Italy did for France in their build-up to facing Ireland. What it fixed for France by having on an absolute demolition mode in Rome was going to a tough away game in Dublin full of confidence.
If England had absolutely demolished Italy, you are then potentially going to Wales with a slightly different mindset.
It was a good win, but you could dissect what England were trying to do into 20-25 minutes of the second-half at Allianz Stadium. It is just a very subtle difference, but I still truly believe this England squad have the personnel to win trophies and to be able to do that they have tor recognise scenarios of dominance.
The likes of Ellis Genge might whinge and moan about former pros not understanding what it takes, but unfortunately they do because they have been successful in the past and won trophies.
They haven’t always been successful, they have had tough times as well but they learnt from them and found ways of winning games in different ways, so when it comes to a scenario, they have got that recall to a previous experience and can get themselves out if it.
