It is pointless denying these are difficult days for England. The inquest into our performance against New Zealand had begun before we arrived back at our new hotel on the outskirts of Marlow on Sunday night. Following the post-match formalities, Andy Robinson summoned us all back to the changing room to stress the importance of not dwelling on the result. Mooching around dejectedly is no use if we are to bounce back immediately against Argentina.
Getting a big defeat out of your system, even so, takes time. It hardly needs me to reveal there was a subdued mood on the bus on Sunday evening. Getting back to your room, switching on the television and seeing "England suffer record loss" was depressing for all concerned. It is not something any player wants to be associated with. It was left to our nutritionist, Matt Lovell, to cheer us up by laying on some spare ribs and chips. You have to get rid of that collective sense of emptiness somehow.
After yesterday morning's ice baths and swimming and stretching sessions, though, there was no avoiding the harsh lessons of the All Black game. There were encouraging signs but what cost us was the clinical way New Zealand profited from our mistakes. It makes it even harder to accept defeat when you have played a part in your own downfall against opponents who were not at their best. We genuinely felt we could catch them cold and cause an upset.
True, they are a top-quality side at the breakdown and are deadly at converting turnover ball. The work they have done in the front five was also evident. Even so, we showed they can be broken down if you take the game to them. It will be interesting to see what happens in their forthcoming Tests against France.
There is no escaping the fact, however, that our game against Argentina has now assumed huge importance. With our relatively inexperienced back line mistakes were always going to happen against New Zealand, but the importance of minimising those lapses has been hammered home. We need to fix those errors and improve our performance against the Pumas, otherwise we will be in trouble. I've been saying for some time now that Italy are developing into a serious force and, trust me, Argentina are a step up on the Italians. There is increasing talk of including the Pumas in the Tri-Nations, or even an expanded Six Nations. They would certainly merit a place in that company. Very few teams tour Argentina in the summer months and come away unscathed. As a result, we are extremely wary of the Pumas. It is a mirror image of the build-up to the All Black game, when nobody gave us a chance. This time it is our turn to go in against a side who are far better than the public perceive them to be.
It is no good lamenting the ifs and buts of Test rugby, not least yesterday's admission by the International Rugby Board that the referee erred in not awarding Jamie Noon a seemingly good try early on. Even the Kiwis thought we had scored, but we can't sit and moan. We all spent years crying out for technology, so now we have a television match official we can't start berating him all the time.
At least we have got a chance to make instant amends, although, as dusk descends outside my window, I've got to be honest and say I haven't a clue what Saturday's team is going to be, nor whether I will be captaining it. The eight squad members not required against New Zealand are back with us and, clearly, they will be immensely keen to be involved when the side to face Argentina is finally announced.
What else would we change this weekend? It's fair to say our journey to Twickenham on Sunday was less than ideal. I fully support our move here from our previous base in Bagshot but, on this occasion, it took over an hour to get to the ground. We did have a police escort but in the current climate they don't want to use their sirens until it is absolutely necessary. We were stuck in traffic on the M4 and by the time we arrived at Twickenham we were behind schedule and had to rush a little bit.
With only six days to prepare for the Pumas we have postponed the traditional welcome ceremony for new caps until the end of the autumn series and downed nothing stronger than water with our spare ribs. That gives Shaun Perry, Anthony Allen and Paul Sackey more time to practise their singing and hopefully, by the end of the month, we will all have more reason to let our hair down.
