Cautious Lancaster cost England
England coach Stuart Lancaster will know that his side missed a golden opportunity to take a 1-0 lead in the three match series against New Zealand. A late Conrad Smith try denied a makeshift England side what would have been a memorable draw, but it was the cautious nature of Lancaster that should draw some criticism too. When Marland Yarde got sin binned for preventing New Zealand scoring after Brodie Retallick's break, it came from a mistake by Ben Youngs at scrum-half. In any other match, Youngs would have been coming on to replace Danny Care, but Care's shoulder injury sustained in training wrecked Lancaster's game plan. However, with Dickson on the bench and having trained, Lancaster should have turned to him at the 60 minute mark to give the game a fresh impetus, and more importantly, take Youngs out of the firing line. It is not to say that Youngs had a bad match, but he didn't have the explosiveness that Care possesses, and bringing on Dickson could have mixed things up in a similar fashion that Cipriani did when he came on.
There were other areas were it seemed that Lancaster was hesitant to go for the kill with Pennell coming on in the dying moments for his debut. He should have been on with 10 or 15 minutes to go where he could have made an impact. When going for victory it is sometimes the case you have to risk it all for the greatest rewards. It is this series in which Lancaster should really push the boundaries of what his time can do, and he should be willing to take a risk or two, if he had been bolder tonight the result could have been very different. That is not to say that Lancaster didn't get things right with the choice of Freddie Burns a huge call, which almost paid off handsomely as he scored four penalties on the back of a very indifferent season with Gloucester. Credit has to go to Kyle Eastmond as well as he proved that he is no shrinking violet when it comes to international rugby at the highest level with a stunning break after great work by Ben Morgan at the back of the scrum. One thing that will be of huge concern to Lancaster is the poor handling skills of his players with the ball countlessly being turned over from knock ons, although it has to be said that Nigel Owens clearly called two knock ons incorrectly. England will feel as if they have let slip a golden opportunity, and even with the returning Saracens and Northampton players, they will know that New Zealand will only get better when it comes to the second test in Dunedin.
