KEY POINTS:
I said last week that the French looked old. Well, the English looked decrepit.
We were having breakfast, getting ready to watch the match and the team pen portraits came up on screen. My wife Felicity said: "God, they're old." In fact the problem with the English who, as the old joke goes were lucky to get the nil in their 36-0 defeat by South Africa, isn't so much age as depth.
England are a year or two past their use-by date but they have clung to their old guys because they either don't have the young players coming up or are unwilling to promote them. I think it is mostly the former and I think they have done themselves a big disservice by their importing of players from New Zealand, Australia and South Africa.
It's not a new observation - I said earlier this year when we were discussing France that a quick look through their top sides showed that 14 out of 18 props were imports. How can any national side develop a front row when that situation is in place?
It's the same with England, the premiership clubs have imported so many players that, if you look around their teams, there is no room for the development of younger players. Even worse, their key link players are nearly all imports so there is no one coming through in the crucial playmaking areas.
It's like their soccer team. Their national team has not benefited from having so many foreigners in the Premiership, although I'd say the depth in English football is greater than English rugby. They are finding now that when, it comes to selection, they have only the inexperienced young and the ageing experienced left in English ranks - and most of the foreigners are in the key positions and making the key plays.
That's why England were so horrible against the USA and that's why they didn't come on any against the Boks. They must have some young players coming through the grades but the system is obviously not promoting them. I can remember when Andrew Mehrtens was playing at Harlequins, he got left on the bench a few times because the club wanted to give a trot to an England under-21 player. Fair enough. But where's that guy now?
Why's he not in the England team instead of Andy Farrell who, I'm sorry, was slow and obvious and all he had going for him was a left boot.
Compare that to the South Africans - who I've got to say could have played better in my book - who had JP Pietersen, who scored two tries, from their world champion under-19 side of a few years back.
That's the problem for the English. The South Africans and the New Zealanders, even though we lose players to the Northern Hemisphere, are developing players as fast as those ones leave. The 'exports' get to Britain and then keep young players from gaining experience.
It's a lose-lose scenario.
