Marcus Smith's four penalties and unconverted try accounted for all of England's points in the 20-17 defeat to Scotland, but head coach Eddie Jones took the decision to replace the fly-half with 63 minutes on the clock
Sunday 6 February 2022 11:18, UK
Eddie Jones defended his decision to take Marcus Smith off in England's defeat to Scotland with 17 minutes remaining.
The fly-half had just kicked England into the lead with his fourth penalty of the Calcutta Cup clash at Murrayfield, having also scored what would prove to be the visitors' only try of the match, when he was replaced by George Ford.
At that point, England led by seven with all of their points coming from Harlequins man Smith. But a dramatic penalty try - and a yellow card for Luke Cowan-Dickie - plus a late penalty from Finn Russell helped Scotland turn the tables to retain the Calcutta Cup with a 20-17 win.
Smith has now been involved in six tries in his six Test appearances for England, scoring three and setting up three others, but head coach Jones was adamant the decision to bring him off with the result still far from certain was the right call.
"We've got a 23-man squad and we felt that George could come on and do a job for us in the last 20 minutes," Jones said.
"For a young team, I thought we fought well, they prepared well, we played well - we just didn't get the result.
"It doesn't change anything. The next three games we look to get as many points as we can and in the last game, if we're in the hunt for the trophy then well and good.
We've got a 23-man squad and we felt that George [Ford] could come on and do a job for us in the last 20 minutes.
"If not, we've played some good rugby, but obviously we want to win the competition and this doesn't really change our approach to the competition."
A see-saw contest ultimately swung Scotland's way in the 66th minute when referee Ben O'Keeffe sent Cowan-Dickie to the sin-bin and awarded a penalty try after the hooker was deemed guilty of a deliberate knock-on close to his own line while trying to prevent Russell's cross-field kick reaching winger Darcy Graham.
Jones gave his backing to the Exeter Chiefs man, though, pointing to England's failure to make the most of their dominance during significant portions of the match and praising Scotland's efforts.
"Luke is disappointed, that happens in the moment," Jones said. "He played exceptionally well, and he is very disappointed, but all the boys are supporting him.
"We have only got ourselves to blame. We are massively disappointed that we lost, and Scotland deserved to win, but we dominated a lot of the game but didn't get the points out of the domination.
"At the end of the day rugby is a pretty simple game - if you dominate you have to get points and you have to get enough to be in front of the opposition at the end.
"The result is the result and it is tough for us to start the tournament like that. We had a good preparation and played with a lot of drive and determination. We will go to Italy next week and be even better."
O'Keeffe could have rewarded England's scrum dominance at the end by giving a penalty which would have given them a chance to level the game with a kick at goal - and the New Zealander was kept busy in the closing stages of an engrossing match.
In reference to Rassie Erasmus' lengthy video critique of the officials during South Africa's victory over the British and Irish Lions last summer, Jones joked that he would emulate the Springboks boss.
"It was three points [difference] at the end and the referee becomes pretty influential in those situations," Jones said.
"Wait for the video, I have got the production team on it now. It is called 'Rassie In Love With'. That is my production team so I am getting ready."
Gregor Townsend praised Scotland for coming on strong in the critical final quarter of a match in which they were second best for long periods.
"It was far from perfect and I think the weather had something to do with that when it was so wet," Scotland head coach Townsend said.
"We knew we were going to be against the wind in the first half and we had to absorb a lot of phased attack from England. We had to be in our half for the majority of that time and we weren't really able to build phase upon phase, through our own errors at times.
"But it was great to see our play executed really well through Darcy Graham and Ben White for the first try. We felt we hadn't fired a huge amount of shots in the first half but we were still leading and we knew in the second we would have a slight advantage with the wind.
"Having said that, the third quarter was the poorest part of the game for us. We're all thankful and proud of how we played in that final quarter, which was telling."
To hear and feel that atmosphere was amazing. We missed the crowd at this fixture last year so to have them back in full voice was special.
Scotland have now won the Calcutta Cup four times in the last five years and Townsend felt their dramatic victory in front of a pumped-up Murrayfield crowd was just as enjoyable as last year's historic win away to England.
"This feels just as good as winning at Twickenham," Townsend said. "It felt like a victory of huge effort that could have gone either way.
"I felt England played really well, so to actually come out on the right end of a tight tussle makes up for the arm-wrestle we lost against them [at Murrayfield] two years ago.
"To hear and feel that atmosphere was amazing. We missed the crowd at this fixture last year so to have them back in full voice was special."
