OK, it was not the best of French performances. The French pack in particular looked a bit flat and Chabal was just short of awful. That said, this was the best England performance for quite a while and had some real positives. Strettle really looks the goods. He has pace, he has moves and he can defend. His was probably the best individual performance by an England back since the world cup. The rest of the backs looked decent to good too and I think this younger (Catt aside), faster (including Catt) line up is very promising. I like the revamped pack too. It is much more mobile with Corrie in the second row and a real open side in Rees. It doesn't seem to have lost any grit and there's no Grewcock to give away really stupid penalties. I think it would be better to have one of the second rows as an enforcer but in the absence of someone who can do that job well I'll settle for Palmer and Corrie.
I'm rather enjoying this year's 6N. After the last world cup I was worried that it was going to settle into a pattern where England and France opened up a big gap between them and the other four. That hasn't happened and that's very positive. Next weekend's games should be extremely interesting. I'll be interested to see who Ashton picks if Farrel and/or Wilkinson are fit. I'd stick with Flood and Catt myself.
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