France vs England match report: Late flurry from Danny Cipriani and Jonathan Joseph cannot hide English faults

The second of England’s three World Cup warm-up friendlies was heading only one way, and in very painful fashion, until a flurry of two tries by Danny Cipriani and Jonathan Joseph in the last nine minutes suggested at least that the long summer’s training including a stint at high altitude in Colorado, had wrought some effect. It was not enough to rescue the result, though, as mistakes and mishaps had given France too big an advantage to be reined in.

An England team broadly similar to this one put seven tries and 55 points on France last March; last night they were at full stretch just to eke six points out a dismal, shockingly uncoordinated first half. The French cruised into a lead of 9-0 inside 15 minutes as England committed a slew of blatant and in some cases soft offences. After three minutes, Luther Burrell – whose performance was under the microscope given all the conjecture over the centres for the World Cup – put in a hearteningly slam of a tackle on the counter-attacking full-back Scott Spedding but Burrell was slow to roll away and Spedding kicked a monster goal from around halfway. For Burrell in the backs, read Tom Youngs in the line-out, where one skew-whiff throw immediately raised angst over absent friends: oh my bleeding Dylan Hartley, where are you now?

There followed more peeps of Jaco Peyper’s whistle against bright white English jerseys: Dan Cole in at the side, James Haskell killing a ruck off his feet and someone in the midfield going offside at a line-out. France’s recalled, 32-year-old fly-half Freddy Michalak sent two kicks through the posts and a severely sloppy first 20 minutes bottomed out for England with a crooked feed from Ben Youngs. When there had been a chance to lift the siege George Ford failed to find touch. It was a rare moment of relief when a safe mark was taken by Mike Brown – the Harlequins full-back playing his first match since March after concussion – under extreme pressure from Yoann Huget chasing Sébastien Tillous-Borde’s deft box-kick.

France kept their foot on the English throat despite Michalak missing for the first time in the 21st minute. The slender No. 10 rediscovered the groove after 25 and 32 minutes, punishing an England wheeled scrum and a high tackle by Billy Vunipola on Huget that was just the right side of yellow-card material. In between, Ford gained a welcome foothold for England, with a penalty goal for not releasing after he hekicked a restart long to the French 22. It needed something like that for England to gain significant territory, and another penalty by Ford to peg France back to 15-6 at half-time felt unfairly unreflective of what had gone before. But Ford had also been short with a penalty attempt from 50 metres out that looked as if it would be beyond his range, and was.

There were more muddles such as Brown running into Ford early in the second half which could only very charitably be put down to rustiness; certainly, the time and place to pull out all the World Cup stops is not Paris in August.

Still, no team led by the workaholic Chris Robshaw should be going gently into that good night, yet apart from a brief flurry of attack featuring the sidestep of the impressive Jack Nowell, it only got worse for England. As France spun the ball flat from a ruck right to left, Michalak in a wide position cleverly carved an opening with a sharp inside pass for the onrushing Huget. The wing shot past a flailing Robshaw, away from Joe Marler and Burrell, and rounded Brown smoothly to score at the posts. Michalak converted and with a scoreline of 22-6, the record of England’s head coach Stuart Lancaster in winning four out of his five matches against the French before this was clearly going to take a dent.

Lancaster’s French counterpart Philippe Saint-André had a meagre 40 per cent win ratio coming here and such a dreadful record on this ground that, when coupled with Les Bleus’ famous World Cup exploits at Twickenham and Cardiff in 1999 and 2007 respectively, they might be glad the global tournament is being staged in England and Wales.

Home advantage will be seized on gratefully be England, no doubt, next month. Jamie George came on for his Test debut and promptly had his first line-out throw pinched. In the 65th minute, with England having grafted substitutes Danny Cipriani and Billy Twelvetrees into the backline for Jonny May and Burrell, Michalak was tossing the ball around like a kid in a playground, knowing he had a penalty coming. It went over for 25-6.

Cipriani had his score, taking advantage of Huget and Spedding standing off him as England attacked to the left from a line-out drive, and Ford converted. Then Mako Vunipola and Brown made space for Joseph, at last, to show his pace for a second England try at the corner, brilliantly converted by Ford.

France: S Spedding; Y Huget, M Bastareaud (G Fickou, 68), W Fofana, N Nakaitaci; F Michalak (R Tales, 70), S Tillous-Borde (R Kockott, 71); E ben Arous (V Debaty, 57), G Guirado (B Kayser, 57), R Slimani (U Atonio, 64), P Pape (A Flanquart, 68) (capt), Y Maestri, D Chouly, B le Roux, L Picamoles (Y Nyanga, 57).

England: M Brown; J Nowell, J Joseph, L Burrell (B Twelvetrees, 64), J May (D Cipriani, 64); G Ford, B Youngs (D Care, 49); J Marler (M Vunipola, 66), T Youngs (J George, 49), D Cole (D Wilson, 66), J Launchbury (D Attwood, 55), C Lawes, J Haskell (N Easter, 55), C Robshaw (capt), B Vunipola.

Referee: J Peyper (South Africa).