Red Roses show who’s No.1 with win over Black Ferns
England women’s head coach John Mitchell says his side will take valuable lessons from the 24-12 win over world champions New Zealand as they build towards their WXV1 title defence.
Tries from captain Marlie Packer, Abby Dow, Ellie Kildunne and Natasha Hunt secured the win at Twickenham to back up last week’s victory over France but they let Katelyn Vahaakolo in for two second half tries.
Mitchell said: “We gave them soft tries, which was our own doing, but it’s good to get these lessons at this time of year.
“It’s really good that we’ve completed this series with two really tough Test matches. For some of the girls it was their first Test rugby for 10 weeks so there was always going to be a bit of rust and they’ll want to get better.
“We were tactically different today; there’s a particular way to play against New Zealand. They’ve got soft errors in them if you’re prepared to stay collected and work together.”
