At Twickenham England comprehensively beat Japan 59-14. It was an expected result but a result nonetheless that England really needed after five straight defeats.
The first half was not pretty, but England was in complete control and at least showed their ruthless instinct by persisting with exploiting Japan’s set-piece inferiority.
Four tries by the forwards underscore this, with three (Sam Underhill and two by Jamie George) coming from line-out maul while Ben Earl’s score came from a line-out strike move that did not come off against Australia but worked beautifully today. Winger Ollie Sleightholme scored the fifth of the first half.
It is the game plan that England attempted to impose all autumn but was able to execute with much greater ease because of the quality of the opposition.
The one frustration was the blitz defence, which continued to malfunction too often. Naoto Saito’s try was a system break down but also, alarmingly, there does not appear to be a voice directing the forwards to their positions, with too many out of the game on the narrow side of the ruck in the build-up to the try.
England led 35-07 at the halftime break. In control but definately not a perfect showing.
England made a sloppy start to the second half as they compounded errors and conceded several penalties, even conceding a scrum penalty.
England only managed to add the first points of the second half when George Furbank scored the host's fifth try after fifteen minutes of play in the second half.
This was followed by tries from Luke Cowan-Dickie (2) and Tom Roebuck while Japan's flanker Kazuki Himeno added a second try for the visitors.
Scorers:
England: Tries: Ben Earl, Sam Underhill, Jamie George (2), Ollie Sleightholme, George Furbank, Luke Cowan-Dickie (2), Tom Roebuck. Conversions: Marcus Smith (7)
Japan: Tries: Naoto Saito, Kazuki Himeno. Conversions: Naoto Saito, Takuro Matsunaga
Teams
England: 15 George Furbank, 14 Tommy Freeman, 13 Ollie Lawrence, 12 Henry Slade, 11 Ollie Sleightholme, 10 Marcus Smith, 9 Jack van Poortvliet, 8 Ben Earl, 7 Sam Underhill, 6 Tom Curry, 5 George Martin, 4 Maro Itoje, 3 Will Stuart, 2 Jamie George (c), 1 Ellis Genge. Replacements: 16 Luke Cowan-Dickie, 17 Fin Baxter, 18 Asher Opoku-Fordjour, 19 Nick Isiekwe, 20 Chandler Cunningham-South; 21 Harry Randall, 22 Fin Smith, 23 Tom Roebuck.
Japan: 15 Takuro Matsunaga, 14 Tomoki Osada, 13 Dylan Riley, 12 Siosaia Fifita, 11 Jone Naikabula, 10 Nicholas McCurran, 9 Naoto Saito (c), 8 Faulua Makisi, 7 Kazuki Himeno, 6 Kanji Shimokawa, 5 Epineri Uluiviti, 4 Sanaila Waqa, 3 Shuhei Takeuchi 2 Mamoru Harada, 1 Takato Okabe. Replacements: 16 Seunghyuk Lee, 17 Yukio Morikawa, 18 Keijiro Tamefusa, 19 Daichi Akiyama, 20 Tevita Tatafu, 21 Ben Gunter, 22 Shinobu Fujiwara, 23 Yusuke Kajimura.