Gatland would never have whinged like Pivac

At last the England team have given their fans something to shout about, at least for one half of the game with an impressive starting 40 minutes last Sunday against Ireland.

For the first time since that great game against New Zealand, the team put in a performance of which they can justifiably be proud.

It wasn’t by any standards a perfect match with many mistakes and some petulant behaviour that could easily have ended in a card of any colour, but fortunately referee Jaco Peyper is an obvious homer so wouldn’t have done anything to upset the majority of the near 82,000 crowd.

What impressed me was the impact new attack coach Simon Amor has already made on the team with a number of new moves to counter the rush defence and some intelligent kicking that created two of England’s tries.

Amor’s Sevens influence also showed itself with the back-line players not appearing to have fixed positions, allowing Jonathan Joseph, Manu Tuilagi, Jonny May and Elliot Daly to interchange positions seemingly at will.

It was also the first game where Eddie Jones didn’t make negative comments about the opposition. That may or may not have contributed to Ireland’s slow start but it certainly seemed a coincidence, which hopefully Jones will learn from.

After this positive result England have got to find the consistency to play for 80 minutes as nothing else will do against Wales next week.

Meanwhile, it’s Wales who have taken over the mantle as the biggest whingers in the game with constant attempts to excuse their losses as being the fault of the referees Romain Poite and Matt Carley.