Jamie George has urged his England teammates to channel the “emotion” of a pressure occasion as they take on Fiji in the quarter-finals of the Rugby World Cup.
Many of the England squad have been drawing on memories of the knockout period four years ago, when a side then coached by Eddie Jones lifted their level to beat Australia and then New Zealand to reach the final.
George was a key figure in that side and remains of paramount importance to Steve Borthwick, with England’s lack of hooker depth a concern.
The front-rower, who turns 33 next week, also has plenty of experiences at club level with Saracens to look back on.
And George believes that he and his colleagues will use the intensity of the contest in the right way as they eye a last-four place.
“We can’t shy away from the fact this is probably one of the biggest games we are ever going to play in,” George said.
“I don’t think we should shy away with any emotion that comes with that. Early on in my career I tried to feel a certain way or tried to be perceived to be feeling a certain way or tried to shy away from emotions. I don’t see why you need to do that.
“We’ve got the space to speak to people, we’ve got a really open group and if people are nervous then that’s fine or if people are excited then that’s the fine, but the most important thing for us is focusing on each week and that’s something we’ve done really well.
“Since we’ve been in France, in particular, we’ve got clear things to go after during the week. We try to know our opposition as well as we possibly can and try to be really clear what we’re going to go through in that week and be as prepared as we can be. When you focus on that it becomes less about the enormity of the occasion.”
England completed an unbeaten pool stage campaign with a narrow win over Samoa.
A scratchy performance seems to have stalled the momentum behind a side that had built well through their first three games in France.
George, who played the entire 80 minutes in Lille and is a certain starter this weekend, admits that his team were far below their best, but insists that fans can expect to see “a different England” in Marseille on Sunday.
“Last weekend wasn’t good enough, it was poor,” George conceded. “We’ve had a really good open, honest review and we’re very clear that some of the stuff wasn’t good enough. “Our energy levels were poor and that’s probably inexcusable to be honest.
“Would we rather it happened then than now? Yes. Will we learn from it? Absolutely. You’ll see a very different England team on Sunday.”
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