England edged out by a point by All Blacks in thrilling affair
ByOli Gent
Published 06/07/2024 at 10:39 GMT+1
England lost narrowly by a point to New Zealand in a thrilling encounter at the Forsyth Barr Stadium in Dunedin. Steve Borthwick's side were beaten 16-15 by the All Blacks, but it is a result that England will rue as they lead 15-13 with quarter of an hour to go. Both teams went in level at 10-10 at the break before Immaneul Feyi-Waboso's try put England ahead, but a Damian McKenzie penalty won it
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England lost agonisingly by a single point to New Zealand 16-15 at the Forsyth Barr Stadium in Dunedin.
Steve Borthwick's side were playing the first of two tests against the All Blacks in their three Summer Internationals, with the second test to come next week at Eden Park in Auckland, where the tourists will be on the hunt for revenge.
It means that England are still searching for a first win against the Kiwis on New Zealand soil since 2003.
Marcus Smith had an early opportunity to put England ahead inside six minutes, but the Harlequins stand-off missed his penalty, and he was soon punished by Sevu Reece, who gathered Damian McKenzie's cross-field kick to steam past Tommy Freeman and go over for the game's opening score.
McKenzie couldn't add the extras, and, after good work from Chandler Cunningham-South to get England towards the All Blacks line, Maro Itoje crashed over to level the scores, before Smith reprieved himself to eke the tourists into the lead.
World player of the year Ardie Savea was the man to deliver New Zealand's instant response after Stephen Perofeta beat Ben Earl all ends up with some fancy footwork, but McKenzie was again inaccurate off the tee as the Kiwis lead by three.
Smith, however, had his shooting boots on, sending the teams in level at the interval with a final penalty, but he couldn't recreate his scoring touch early on in the second half, as he missed a penalty on 44 minutes.
That didn't matter as Immanuel Feyi-Waboso capitalised on some brilliant legwork by Freeman, before being fed by Smith to slide over and put England into the unlikeliest of leads, but despite his assist, the England fly-half couldn't convert.
McKenzie finally discovered his kicking form when it mattered on 53 minutes as his penalty cut the deficit to just two, and the game was turned on its head as the All Blacks' no. 10 kicked over another to edge the hosts' noses in front with quarter of an hour to play.
Borthwick's men threw everything at the dying embers of the encounter, but could not muster a final score.
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"There were fine margins; two tries apiece," England coach Borthwick told Sky Sports afterwards.
"here wasn’t much in that at all. You look at that second half, it was a real arm wrestle in the middle of the field. Immense credit to New Zealand for taking their opportunities and getting over the line at the end. We’ll have a good debrief of it and look at how we move forward."
The tourists' captain Jamie George spoke of how proud he was of his side's performance.
"I’m incredibly proud of what we achieved; the way we went out and attacked the game," the Saracens hooker said.
"Not a lot of teams come to New Zealand and do that. That shows a great amount of growth in this team. There are definitely some areas - the scrum definitely and the breakdown another - [where we can improve], but we’ll do a lot of honest work this week and make sure we go to Eden Park next week fully prepared."
Maro Itoje said that the visitors would "relish the chance to go again" at Eden Park next week, when the two sides will meet once for the second test.
"Every game is an experience; something to build from," the try-scorer said.
"Every game is something to learn from and we were one point from winning that game. If the result happened in the last phase of the game, the result could have gone the other way. We’ll lick our wounds; we’ll get better. We’ll learn from our mistakes, and this will be a valuable lesson for us."
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