Jamie George discusses England's 'favourites' tag

England were put through the mill by France on Sunday but emerged on the other side victorious and thus claimed the Autumn Nations Cup.

In the wake of a game which took England and France into two periods of extra time before a winner was finally decide, English hooker Jamie George discussed living with the ‘favourites’ tag and its effects on a team.

“That’s actually something we speak quite a lot about as a team,” he said.

“We have some specific meetings where the players speak – and we had a very open and honest conversation about exactly that. We felt like we have more to give when we go in as favourites against the underdogs.

“Actually we probably didn’t do that against France, but again it’s a great learning curve for us going forwards. The more we win, the more we will be favourites going into games and we need to work it out.

“One thing I’m really confident about is that we’ve got the right people in place and the team is going in the right direction.”

England enjoyed a good year, hoisting the 6 Nations cup as well as the Autumn Nations Cup and appear to going from strength to strength under the mentorship of head coach Eddie Jones, who said after the game that, a year ago, his team would have crumbled under the pressure that the French threw at them on the weekend.

“We had a lot more control when things weren’t going our way,” George continued. “Twelve months ago when things weren’t going our way we probably got a little bit rattled.

“As a leadership group we probably didn’t use to handle things as well as we could, whereas against France it felt like the leaders did a great job in making sure everyone stayed calm and in control and trusted in the process.

“France were exceptional but we dug in and showed some resilience to get over the line.”

With the 6 Nations imminent, George seems upbeat about the current state of things in his team’s camp as well as the quality of preparation they derived from the Autumn Nations Cup.

“This campaign has been a really positive one. Week by week and tournament by tournament we’re seeing massive strides in us as a team.

“The resilience of the team – definitely against France – has grown from the Six Nations until now. I feel like we’re in a really good place and the next Six Nations is just around the corner.

“It’s an exciting time to be part of this team and it’s exciting to see where we can take things off the back of a positive autumn.”