England 12-11 South Africa: Victory at Twickenham 'close to miraculous'
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Highlights: England 12-11 South Africa: England edge topsy-turvy win
This is supposedly an autumn that sets the mood music for the World Cup that follows 10 months on. By the end at Twickenham on Saturday that music was half heavy metal thunder and half Benny Hill theme music. It was a match that was thrilling and flawed and sloppy and beautiful all at the same time.
By the end no-one was talking about the World Cup either. When a game comes down to a single point and the fifth minute of added time you can't look further than the mayhem happening directly in front of your nose.
England will not win playing like this every week. A similarly supine start against New Zealand next weekend will see the black shirts reduced to a blur in the far distance. In the first half they had only 22% territory and 33% possession. Not once did they have possession of the ball in the Springbok 22.
That they were only two points down had something to do with dogged defence and rather more with South African profligacy but mattered more than all those other stats bundled together.
Hanging in there is an under-appreciated skill in international sport. No-one sets out to merely survive but keeping your head above water when all others are losing theirs takes an awful lot of fight and guts and an illogical amount of self-belief.
Imbalance up front
Seven of England's starting pack had fewer combined caps than the one other. Four were making their home England debuts. Two more debutants came off the bench within seconds of the interval.
You could tell. In that nightmarish first 40 minutes England's forwards resembled the henchman in Austin Powers who looks like he is about to be splattered under a steamroller only to stay upright for an implausibly long time.
Dylan Hartley had 93 England caps, the rest of the starting pack combined had 72
The Springboks had so many chances to crush them that you just assumed it was inevitable. Maro Itoje in the sin-bin, repeated line-outs on England's five-metre line, a scrum rumbling forward and runners crashing through flailing defensive arms.
Had England been 15 points down they could have had few complaints. For them to salvage a win felt close to miraculous, and it was with the zeal of the freshly converted that the home crowd celebrated at the end.
Pressure on Jones eases
It is a long time since Eddie Jones felt like English rugby's messiah. It was also a game when too many of his players were very naughty boys. His England have been defined over the past 10 months by indiscipline, shaky defence and an inability to adapt to the challenges in front of them.
To steal this one away by sorting out all three, however belatedly, has lightened an increasingly pressing burden on their coach's shoulders and bought all of them time.
Across the 84 minutes England still had only 41% possession and 36% territory. Handre Pollard hit the outside of the post with a penalty that would have won it for the visitors and never called for the drop-goal that would have done the same in the dying moments.
'A good solid tackle'
Even with the clock in the red it could have gone the other way. Owen Farrell's tackle on Andre Esterhuizen may not fulfil some observers' definition of that act. His shoulder was high and his head looking the other way and his arms not around the South African when the two came together.
What Jones described afterwards, all grins and sly innocence, as "a good solid tackle" may on another day lead to a penalty and defeat. The speed with which the two men came together and the shock of the impact may have made it hard to hold on, but it was not a look improved by slow-motion or freeze-frame.
Owen Farrell's tackle on Andre Esterhuizen has sparked plenty of debate on social media
Jones' counterpart Rassie Erasmus had sufficient other reasons to feel hard done by. Had his hooker Malcolm Marx not thrown with the accuracy of namesake Groucho,, external had his other forwards not repeatedly spilled the ball in such slapstick fashion, the game would have been safely tucked away.
Instead he wore the look of a man who has done all the hard work wooing a girl only to stumble moving in for the kiss and ending up headbutting her chin.
"The only thing that counts is that one point on the scoreboard," he said. "We didn't finish our opportunities. And if you don't finish your opportunities and give away too many penalties you'll lose the Test match.
"If it [Farrell] was a shoulder charge the referee would have given a penalty. If it was a good tackle then well done because I haven't seen Esterhuizen stopped like that before.
"Nothing upset me. It if was legal we should latch on and do it because it's very effective."
By the time you read this, a retrospective sanction may have come Farrell's way. Jones is long enough in the tooth to throw out a smokescreen ("You can get cited now for something you did at a party when you were 15,") but also relished everything his fly-half brought to the contest.
Fantastic Farrell
Farrell began as his side's co-captain but ended it, as usual, as both its heartbeat and epitomising its snarling, uncompromising, relentless best version.
It is a rare thing to see him start at 10 but awfully familiar to see him lead from the front, a player who relishes the brutal sturm and drang of a game like this and yet drops from ferocious to dead calm when the penalties come and the little gaps open up.
England claimed their 15th win against South Africa
England were wasteful with at least two try-scoring opportunities as they first stemmed the tide and then turned it in the second half, Elliot Daly ignoring Jonny May's freedom down the left and Brad Shields losing the ball in the corner minutes later.
Farrell doesn't do waste. Nor does he do much self-doubt. Barely had referee Angus Gardner begun telling him that there was no late infraction than he was wheeling away to short-arm jab the air in celebration of victory.
"When you get in those arm-wrestles, someone's going to give," grinned Jones afterwards. "And we didn't give."