Wales captain Dewi Lake has apologised to supporters after his side's comprehensive 48-7 defeat by England in the Six Nations. The visitors were second best in all departments and have now lost 22 of their last 24 Test matches, with a buoyant France heading to Cardiff next Sunday.
Lake did not mince his words after the heavy loss, which saw Wales concede seven tries and receive four yellow cards. “We let ourselves down, we let people down,” he said. “We spoke all week about what we were going to produce and we didn’t do it. We said we would get the fans on their feet and we didn’t today.”
The Wales head coach, Steve Tandy, was similarly dismayed. “We are bitterly disappointed. We were inaccurate and couldn’t get any momentum. Playing England with 15 men is tough enough. Playing with 13 men for almost 20 minutes is hard.”
England head coach Steve Borthwick praised his side’s performance as they extended their winning run to 12. “I thought defensively we were excellent, I thought our kicking game was excellent,” he said. Borthwick also hailed Henry Arundell, whose first-half hat-trick took his Test tally to 11 in 12 appearances.
Jamie George noted the platform created ahead of next week’s Calcutta Cup match at Murrayfield. “Regardless of who we were playing next week it’s a brilliant platform. We wanted to start with a bang and I thought we did that today.”
