Red Roses captain Sarah Hunter outlined to The Rugby Paper that her England side is not daunted by the favourites tag going into autumn‘s Rugby World Cup in New Zealand.
Speaking to The Rugby Paper Podcast, Hunter outlined: “More pressure comes from ourselves with what we want to do.
“Going into tournaments, people label teams as favourites, underdogs – all sort of things.
“You have to park it to one side and just focus on what we’re about. We can’t let the outside noise infiltrate in!”
England won their fourth Grand Slam in a row last weekend, with victory in France being the Red Roses’ 23rd consecutive victory.
England all-time appearance holder Rochelle ‘Rocky’ Clark feels that England are definitely going in as favourites.
“If you look at the recent record – they’ve won 23 in a row. They’re certainly going in as clear favourites!
“The teams that you’d expect to challenge they have beaten convincingly – against New Zealand and a closer game in France.
“In France with a big crowd, they were able to come back from being down. They’re going in very confident.
“They need to make sure that when the pressure comes that they have all the tools to deal with upsets that may happen or stuff that they aren’t used to. They need to stick into the process.”
Ahead of the 2017 tournament, England went into the World Cup having won a Grand Slam in the Six Nations as well as beating pre-tournament rivals New Zealand.
England looked to defend their crown in 2017. But, ultimately lost to the Black Ferns 41-32 in a thrilling final.
Hunter said: “It kind of doesn’t matter what your form is like before a tournament, it’s all about when you get there.
“We have an incredible squad – so it is about making that function when that matters. Otherwise, it is a long way to have another crack at it.”
The Rugby Paper Podcast is available to download or stream on Apple, Spotify, Google and Amazon.
