Borthwick, it's time to own up – Andy Goode

England are always in the fight under Steve Borthwick but the head coach has to take accountability for repeatedly failing to land a knockout blow and this weekend was the worst example yet.

Aside from the runaway victory over Japan and nine-point defeat in Scotland, the other 11 of England’s last 13 Tests have all been decided by a margin less than a converted try and they’re developing a worrying habit of not being able to close games out.

With a lead of eight points and only 18 minutes remaining, the decision to take off both halfbacks against the All Blacks on Saturday was clearly a mistake. That might be easy to say in hindsight but I said it at the time and it’s a point I’ve made previously.

Eddie Jones made the error of taking Marcus Smith off just after the hour mark against Scotland in 2022, England turning a seven-point lead into a defeat, and Borthwick has now done the same as his mentor.

Marcus Smith of England reacts during the Autumn Nations Series 2025 match between England and New Zealand All Blacks at Allianz Stadium on November 2, 2024 in London, England. (Photo by Craig Mercer/MB Media/Getty Images)

Smith isn’t a kid anymore, he has 36 caps to his name and he isn’t a maverick, he’s more than capable of managing games at international level. He’s England’s first-choice fly-half and deserves the trust of his coach to see the job through.

There are only three reasons why you should be taking your first choice fly-half off. If he’s having a stinker, if you’re so far behind and you need a different spark or you’re so far in front that you think the game’s won, that’s fine. Otherwise, leave him on.

The use of replacements has been a contentious subject before with some of them looking preordained but it isn’t normally such a major issue with a prop, a back-rower or an outside back, replacing your fly-half is completely different though.

As the fulcrum of the team, it takes a while to get into the game and adjust to the pace and you don’t have the same feel for what’s going on as the man who’s been on the pitch for the previous hour.

When you add to that the fact that George Ford has only played 86 minutes of rugby this season and hasn’t featured for over a month, it’s even harder to understand the decision.

Ford missed the penalty and drop goal to win the game, and missed the tackle on Mark Tele’a for the critical All Blacks try, but it’s his head coach rather than him who should be taking the flak.

We’ve seen his defensive frailties before and he shouldn’t have gone so high in the tackle on Tele’a and you’d expect him to nail the penalty but the pass from Harry Randall made his job really difficult for the drop goal. He shouldn’t have been put in that position though.

A disconsolate George Ford - PA

The commentators suggested Borthwick would have seen it as a dream scenario when Ford came on to see out the game but that just highlights the flawed mindset he has at the moment.

England just needed to keep playing and they would have got over the line or landed that one final blow, you can’t just park the bus against the best teams in the world and England have been guilty of doing that in three straight Tests against New Zealand.

This was the most obvious example but England have scored just three points in the final half-hour of those three consecutive Tests against the All Blacks, three points in 90 minutes of rugby at the end of big Test matches.

Those are the championship minutes, the ones that decide who wins and loses and England are being far too conservative and conceding the momentum to their opponents.

New Zealand conceded 11 penalties and 21 turnovers on Saturday, not numbers you’d usually associate with them, and England had them where they wanted them but they couldn’t put them away.

Many of those errors were forced by England, who deserve a lot of credit for the performance they put in for the first hour, but a lot of the positives still came in defence or from individual brilliance.

In Immanuel Feyi-Waboso, England have a generational talent (Photo by Dan Mullan/Getty Images)

Maro Itoje was immense, Chandler Cunningham-South put in some huge hits and Immanuel Feyi-Waboso dazzled once more but England’s bench failed to make an impact, whereas New Zealand’s took the game by the scruff of the neck.

As well as Damian McKenzie’s influence, Cam Roigard injected pace, Asafo Aumua was everywhere in the loose, the replacement props did a job at set piece and Patrick Tuipulotu had nine carries and six significant tackles.

There’s no doubt Borthwick has done some very good work with this England side over the past couple of years but he needs to hold his hands up, accept he’s made an error with his replacements in this one and adopt a less negative approach.

Most of the defeats he’s endured have been tight ones but a win ratio of 52 per cent simply isn’t good enough for an England head coach and a shift in mentality is needed to improve that.

I don’t think there’s any way he’d have taken Smith off for the final quarter against Japan or Australia so I think he’s guilty of paying the All Blacks too much respect and paid the price for shutting up shop.

(Photo by Glyn Kirk/AFP via Getty Images)

Who knows what the dynamic is like behind the scenes between fly half and head coach but you’d like to think Smith is spitting feathers at being replaced at that stage of the game when he’s the main man and had led his side into position to win it.

I’m not suggesting he should be ranting and raving to Borthwick but hopefully he’ll be able to make the point that he deserves to be given the trust to see games out and steer his team home.

It’s a shame because you don’t get many good opportunities to beat the All Blacks and this is undoubtedly one that has gone begging, now the pressure is on against Australia and South Africa.

They’ll be expected to beat the former but if they don’t beat the latter before presumably getting past Japan, it’ll be a return of two from four this autumn with wins over just the 10^th and 14^th ranked sides in the world and that’s below par by anyone’s standards.