{"id":16024,"date":"2025-11-24T17:51:36","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T15:51:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers\/channelafrica\/news\/i-told-you-we-were-going-in-right-direction-englands-borthwick\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:31:22","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:31:22","slug":"i-told-you-we-were-going-in-right-direction-englands-borthwick","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/i-told-you-we-were-going-in-right-direction-englands-borthwick\/","title":{"rendered":"I told you we were going in right direction: England&#8217;s Borthwick"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>England finished last year&#8217;s Autumn series with a win over Japan to end a run of five defeats, with coach Steve Borthwick promising the good times were just around the corner, and a year on it seems he knew what he was talking about.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">They began 2025 with defeat by Ireland, but have since gone on impressive 11-match winning run that, ahead of next month&#8217;s 2027 World Cup draw, has lifted them to third in the rankings behind New Zealand and runaway leaders South Africa.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\"><\/div>\n<div>Sunday&#8217;s 27-23 victory over Argentina completed a clean sweep of four Autumn Internationals for the first time since 2016, Eddie Jones&#8217;s first year in charge.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">It was probably the least impressive of the four, however, after beating Australia, Fiji and New Zealand, but the fact they held off a late Puma fightback was indicative of the team&#8217;s development.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;I&#8217;m pleased with the results, pleased with many aspects of the performance we found a way to win,&#8221; Borthwick said after Sunday&#8217;s game, in which England raced to a 17-0 lead but finished defending a lineout on their own five-metre line with the clock in the red.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">&#8220;I think we&#8217;ve seen growth in some areas. I think there&#8217;s plenty of things to work upon as well. As I said at the time (a year ago), sometimes you&#8217;ve got to go through some tight losses to understand how to actually convert into wins with a young side. That&#8217;s what the team&#8217;s doing.<\/div>\n<div class=\"x_elementToProof\">&#8220;The depth is building as is the number of games these guys are playing together and the experience level is also increasing.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":13859,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-16024","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"Sunday's 27-23 victory over Argentina completed a clean sweep of four Autumn Internationals for the first time since 2016.","published_date":null,"news_description":"Sunday's 27-23 victory over Argentina completed a clean sweep of four Autumn Internationals for the first time since 2016.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/16024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/16024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20011,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/16024\/revisions\/20011"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=16024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}