England win Six Nations Championship after France turn on the style to end Ireland’s hopes

England were crowned 2020 Six Nations champions after France defeated Ireland 35-27 at the Stade de France, with the home side failing to put enough points on the board to prevent Eddie Jones’s side from reclaiming the title for the first time in three years.

Following England’s bonus-point win 34-5 victory over Italy in Rome, all eyes were on Paris as Ireland required either a four-try win over the French or a six-point triumph to give themselves a second title in three years.

But they never really looked like doing it against a French side that ran in four breathtaking tries as they ended Ireland’s hopes of victory, with the scoreline falling well short of the 31-point swing Les Bleus needed themselves to claim the championship.

It means a third Six Nations title for England under Jones, with the squad set to fly back to London on Sunday morning where they will be presented with the trophy back at their Twickenham base.

After outgoing champions Wales opened ‘Super Saturday’ with a fifth consecutive defeat in a 14-10 loss to Scotland - ensuring they languished down in fifth place in this year’s table - England ground their way past a resilient Italian side to honour Ben Youngs’s 100th cap in style, with the scrum-half scoring twice as they secured the crucial bonus point that would end up giving them the championship bragging rights.

Addition tries from Jamie George - on his 50th appearance for England - Tom Curry and Henry Slade saw England fail to hit the cricket score expected against an Italian side that leaked 50 points last weekend against the Irish, which fuelled hopes in Paris that the target of a six-point win would be achievable for Andy Farrell’s side.

But this French side has been completely rejuvenated under the guidance of Fabien Galthie and, more importantly, through the half-back combination of Antoine Dupont and Romain Ntamack, and was fitting to see them pull the strings to inspire a convincing victory over Ireland to hand the title to England.

It was Dupont who finished the first try for France after beautiful footwork from wing Gael Fickou, who fixed tighthead prop Andrew Porter before gassing him on the outside. With scrum-half Conor Murray also left in his wake, Fickou fed Dupont to go over and score, but Ireland immediately hit back as loosehead prop Cian Healy powered over from close range to level the scores.

Johnny Sexton nudged Ireland into a narrow lead with a penalty soon after, but once France regained control of the game they never looked back. A yellow card to French full-back Antony Boutier was soon followed by one to Irish flanker Caelan Doris, but the latter was punished far more as he conceded a penalty try for hauling down Francois Cros with the try line at his mercy.

Ireland were far from out of the contest, but at 14-10 down they needed to score next yet came up short just before half-time as France defended their own line with their lives to keep the lead intact. Sexton added a penalty, but France responded with back-to-back tries that took the game out of their grasp.

Again, it was the Dupont show. With the ball whipped out wide to Fickou, the wing kicked down the touchline, allowing the scrum-half to beat Doris and Conway for pace, and as he headed towards the touchline he picked out Ntamack to send the fly-half over to score.

Ireland clung on, thanks largely to Robbie Henshaw’s beautiful solo try as he beat six french defenders on a precise switch-back move, but it still felt like Ireland were on the ropes. And so it proved.

Ntamack added two further penalties before turning provider with a lovely score. Bouthier regathered his own up-and-under, and managed to free his arms in contact to offload to the stand-off. With his confidence flowing, Ntamack chipped over the Irish defence, mazed his way through the Irish half to dodge the green shirts in front of him, before giving Virimi Vakatawa the easiest of scores to build a 15-point lead that all but killed off Ireland’s championship hopes.

Jacob Stockdale was able to run in a late consolation for Ireland, but it wasn’t enough to clinch the victory they so desperately wanted as the celebrations started in Rome.

"It’s a massive achievement for us as a group to win the Guinness Six Nations in the strangest year and circumstances,” said England captain Owen Farrell.

“We’ve worked really hard in training the past few weeks to get ready for the Italy game, we knew what we had to do and we kept our focus and got the result.

“This is a great group of players, we really think we can continue to get better and achieve more for England. We’re turning our attentions now to the Autumn Nations Cup, we want consistent success and we’re working hard to be better in each and every game.

“We know how difficult things are for everyone at home at the moment and we’ve been saying all through our training camps how we want to do our bit to make people smile.  Hopefully we’ve done that today and we’ll do more of the same throughout the autumn.”