This victory means England are still on course for their second Grand Slam in as many years, however, their final two opponents Scotland and Ireland will see this game as a potential weakness in their mentality and something they will hope to exploit in the coming weeks.
Advertisement
Scotland, however, are on a roll after beating Wales 29-13 at Murrayfield on Saturday and they have now won two out of their three Six Nations matches this season.
However, while World Rugby has previously announced it is looking into the tackle and ruck laws via its law review process, it is understood no specific changes to the law in question are under way.
The Welsh referee has previously encountered situations like Italy’s refusal to engage in rucks, which alters the offside line, and says they’re nothing new.
The Italians – huge underdogs for the game – held a halftime lead at Twickenham for the first time after confusing England by not contesting the breakdown, freeing their players to get beyond the usual ruck line and block any passes behind the tackle area.
“Italian rugby has to think outside the norm or else it will never catch up”, insisted O’Shea whose side had suffered a 63-10 thrashing by Ireland in Rome in their previous match. “It can’t be allowed so the law must be changed”, Woodward wrote.
“I thought they were outstanding, the simplicity of their tries”.
“It’s not an anomaly in the law, it’s just a part of the game, a shock tactic that a team might use now and again but certainly if you became predictable by doing it you’d be cut to bits”.
“There’s a few things to work out here looking at the England performance first of all England can not blame ruck-gate for their first half performance”.
Instead of chasing Care, Italy counterpart Edoardo Gori blocked his running and passing lines by standing in what would have been offside positions had any rucks formed. “You want in behind them, and then you can go and play and that’s why tries came”.
But the result was overshadowed by the debate about Italy’s tactics. We saw a Trevor Chappell game of rugby today.
The Bath fly-half admits the Test match acted as a learning curve, and he draws confidence from the way England were able to overcome the challenge.”We need to push ourselves in training, get ourselves in a good spot, and get our house in order”. “So it’s got some flaws”.
Conor O’Shea’s Italy side were defeated 36-15 at Twickenham on Sunday (26 February) but led at half-time after refusing to commit players at the breakdown, causing confusion in the ranks of the home side.
“It’s a courageous team that tries it”. So bewildered were England’s players that they were asking French referee Romain Poite how to counter the tactic.
“I am flabbergasted with Eddie Jones’ reaction to it”.
“He’s a character, isn’t he?”
“I think Eddie has said everything that needs to be said about it”.
Advertisement
“It was unusual. I hope it gets addressed before then [the visit of Scotland]”.
