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Cardiff - The England rugby team have admitted that poor finishing cost them the game against Wales on Saturday.
Click to BUY the Rugby World Cup Final 2007 DVD
England dominated the match and spent a large portion of the game in the opposition half, but failed to score from 12 of their visits to Wales’ 22 metre area.
The Six Nations champions eventually lost the game 19 - 9, prompting manager Martin Johnson to express his frustration at his team’s lack of killer instinct.
"It’s the strangest game I think I’ve ever seen: to dominate a team so much, but only go in 6-all at half time – then to go on and lose is obviously very disappointing and pretty frustrating to say the least,” Johnson is reported to have said on the England RFU website.
"You work so hard in the build up to a Test match like that – you really shouldn’t let things go. We made mistakes and didn’t score points when we were down in their 22 – it’s pretty simple.
"We had plenty of opportunities and made the breaks – Mike Tindall and Danny Care got through, Banners [Matt Banahan] probably should have had one in the corner."
The teams were level at half-time after England flyhalf Toby Flood's two penalties were matched by his Welsh counterpart Rhys Priestland.
In the second half, England could only add three more points, via another penalty from Flood, while Wales scored 13 points through a converted try and two penalties from Welsh utility back James Hook.
According to a separate post on the RFU website, Flood was also disappointed by the team’s failure to score a try in the game and said that team needed to become more clinical before the start of the Rugby World Cup.
"I don’t like using the word, but yes it’s a bit embarrassing that we couldn’t score a try out there. It hurts and to be really, brutally honest, it’s shameful,” said Flood.
"We need to go away and work out what we need to be doing in those kind of situations. Ultimately you can attempt to kick your way there, but tries at world cups are massive and we’re not going to get 12 or 15 opportunities in the red zone at the world cup, we’re going to get two or three.”
Click to BUY the Rugby World Cup Final 2007 DVD
England dominated the match and spent a large portion of the game in the opposition half, but failed to score from 12 of their visits to Wales’ 22 metre area.
The Six Nations champions eventually lost the game 19 - 9, prompting manager Martin Johnson to express his frustration at his team’s lack of killer instinct.
"It’s the strangest game I think I’ve ever seen: to dominate a team so much, but only go in 6-all at half time – then to go on and lose is obviously very disappointing and pretty frustrating to say the least,” Johnson is reported to have said on the England RFU website.
"You work so hard in the build up to a Test match like that – you really shouldn’t let things go. We made mistakes and didn’t score points when we were down in their 22 – it’s pretty simple.
"We had plenty of opportunities and made the breaks – Mike Tindall and Danny Care got through, Banners [Matt Banahan] probably should have had one in the corner."
The teams were level at half-time after England flyhalf Toby Flood's two penalties were matched by his Welsh counterpart Rhys Priestland.
In the second half, England could only add three more points, via another penalty from Flood, while Wales scored 13 points through a converted try and two penalties from Welsh utility back James Hook.
According to a separate post on the RFU website, Flood was also disappointed by the team’s failure to score a try in the game and said that team needed to become more clinical before the start of the Rugby World Cup.
"I don’t like using the word, but yes it’s a bit embarrassing that we couldn’t score a try out there. It hurts and to be really, brutally honest, it’s shameful,” said Flood.
"We need to go away and work out what we need to be doing in those kind of situations. Ultimately you can attempt to kick your way there, but tries at world cups are massive and we’re not going to get 12 or 15 opportunities in the red zone at the world cup, we’re going to get two or three.”
