Chiefs trio help England into Cup Final

By Mark Stevens
28/11/20

Exeter Chiefs trio Henry Slade, Luke Cowan-Dickie and Jonny Hill helped England book a place in the Autumn Nations Cup against France with a24-13 win over an improved Wales in Llanelli.

Wales - who included another Chief, Tomas Francis in their ranks - opened the scoring with a runaway try from centre Johnny Williams before a score from Slade and two Owen Farrell penalties gave the visitors an 11-7 half-time lead.

England prop Mako Vunipola added a second-half try, while Farrell finished with 14 points.

It was a seventh defeat in nine games for Wales coach Wayne Pivac, who saw an improved defensive display.

Wales are still though without firm foundations, with a struggling scrum and malfunctioning line-out which England punished in a game dominated by kicking from both sides.

The heavy England victory predicted by many never materialised, but the win for Eddie Jones' men saw them finish top of Group A.

This means they will compete for the title of this new tournament on December 6 at Twickenham against France, who topped Group B after defeating Italy 36-5 in Paris.

Wales, who lost to Ireland before beating Georgia, are currently in third place in Group A, and will face Italy next Saturday in Llanelli if they remain in this position.

Scotland have finished second in Group B, with their opponent on the final weekend most likely to be Ireland as long as Andy Farrell's side do not suffer a heavy defeat to Georgia on Sunday.

Post-game, England coach Eddie Jones said: “At half-time it could have been a ‘Psycho’ horror movie. The woman goes to the shower and you know what’s coming from behind the shower curtain,” head coach Jones said.

“Wales did a few things at the end of the first half to put us off our game and then we had a choice at half-time of how would we react. Would we allow them to continue to do that or do we stick to our game?

“The boys showed really good tactical discipline to stick to our game. We had one little wonky period for around 10 minutes in the second half but generally we had game control so I was really pleased about that.”

England’s last defeat was against France at the start of the 2020 Six Nations – a competition they subsequently won – and since then they have compiled a series of solid if unspectacular wins.

“We don’t feel like we’ve played our best rugby yet so it’s our last game. It’s our grand final of 2020 and we want to make sure we put on our best performance,” Jones said. “We want to make sure we put on a performance that lights up people’s eyes when they sit there and they look at the team and they want to be part of the team.”