DUBLIN -- England head coach Steve Borthwick said his team's inexperience played a key role in their 27-22 Six Nations defeat to Ireland in Dublin on Saturday.
England led 10-5 at the break thanks to a Cadan Murley try and five points from the boot of Marcus Smith. But heading into the last five minutes of the match, England were 27-10 down after Bundee Aki, Tadhg Beirne and Dan Sheehan all scored, leaving Borthwick's side to secure a losing bonus point late on thanks to tries from Tom Curry and Tommy Freeman.
It was England's seventh defeat in their last nine Tests -- both those victories coming against Japan. Borthwick said he was pleased with improvement he saw in England's attack, but said Ireland's experience told.
"If you look at today's game, you see two different teams," Borthwick told a news conference. "If you look at the game, you see an Ireland team that has been together for such a huge amount time with 1,200 caps and an England team that has been together for six months and has half that number of caps.
"The guys went out and if you had been watching that start of the game, you wouldn't see that difference. It is a team that wants to play aggressively with the ball and I think we took a step forward in that attack and the defence has improved.
"To be clear we want to win every game but we didn't today and we are disappointed with that and I think there are elements we take and build and show the progress we made in the training camp the last 10 days."
Maro Itoje captained England for the first time, and said the team will have to look at how the match slipped away from them in the final quarter. "I thought the first half was fantastic," Itoje told ITV. "We did pretty much everything we wanted to. We lost territory though in the second half and struggled to exit. It is hard to dissect what the reason is right now but it was a territory thing."
For Borthwick, attention now shifts to France, who are next up at Twickenham. Fabien Galthie's side will travel to England having beaten Wales 43-0 in their Six Nations opener on Friday evening. Borthwick is adamant England will improve and said key to that is the team's self-belief.
"We play France next week and we're looking forward to being back at Twickenham next week in front our supporters," Borthwick said.
"You have to credit Ireland, they're a world-class team and have been world class for so long, and you guys will know the numbers of how long Ireland have been in the top four of the rankings for so long. And I think that experience told in the third quarter where I thought tactically they played really well and that allowed them to get the scoreboard pressure that we couldn't claw back.
"I'm really disappointed we came up short because I thought we could come here and win this game. And I think our players gave that a good go. You certainly saw a belief in the players that they could come here and win the game. And we didn't, so we'll ensure that we're a better team next week against France back at Twickenham, back at Allianz Stadium."
Further reading:
- Why each team will find Six Nations success, and why they won't
- WATCH: Can Scotland win their first title since 1999? ESPN writers debate
- Six Nations and Women's Six Nations: Full fixture list
- Six Nations history, past winners, more