England had a 13-9 lead thanks to Lewis Ludlam’s early try and George Ford’s kicking prowess at halftime.
Japan’s Rikiya Matsuda added his fourth penalty soon after halftime to close the gap to just one point. However, England responded with a try by Courtney Lawes after the ball took a fortunate bounce off prop Joe Marler’s head.
Freddie Steward scored in the corner after receiving Ford’s precise cross-field kick, and Joe Marchant added a bonus-point try in the final play as England secured their second win at Rugby World Cup 2023.
George Ford, named the Mastercard Player of the Match, commented, “We’re just really happy with another win tonight. We knew it was going to be a tough game.
They’re a great team, Japan, they challenge you in different ways. We knew it wouldn’t be until the third or fourth quarter that we could potentially pull away a bit. I’m just over the moon to get another win. Some improvements tonight, some things to get better at still.”
England captain Courtney Lawes added, “Full credit to Japan. We knew they were going to put up a fight and they certainly did that. The conditions are probably not as good as they look. It’s so greasy out there. The boys did well; we came away with five points so you can’t ask for much more.”
Reflecting on Joe Marler’s fortunate assist for a try, Lawes said, “I thanked him. A bit of luck – sometimes it falls in your favour. I’ll take it.”
With two wins from two games, England’s head coach Steve Borthwick expressed his satisfaction, saying, “I’m really pleased for the players. I’m really pleased for the supporters here tonight. We’ve got fantastic travelling support, and they spend an awful lot of money to follow this team, and we want to make sure they have good nights. Tonight it was really tough; we got a bonus point, so we’re really pleased with that.”
Japan’s head coach Jamie Joseph praised his team, stating, “Really proud of my team. We created a lot of opportunities; we just made too many mistakes. England put us under a lot of pressure, but there were times in the first 16 minutes it was a real arm-wrestle – we just needed to capitalize on those opportunities, and we weren’t quite able to.”
Captain Kazuki Himeno added, “I believe that we gave it part of what we planned to do, but in the second half, we had the unfortunate luck which gave up a try and allowed them to score more.
We will need to take what we did well in terms of creating our game and put it into the second half. That was one of the takeaways for us and needs improving. Tough games will continue, so we need to completely improve that point.”
Source: AGENCIES
