And so another Six Nations draws to a close. Having faced the toughest three competitors first, England played Scotland in the final game of this years competition. After an unsuccessful run of three games at the start of the competition, England seem to be getting the winning formula back, having successfully beaten both the Italians and now the Scots.

England slotted 7 tries in total, making the final score 43-22.

Man of the Match Jamie Noon had an excellent game, securing three of the seven tries and becomes the first hat-trick scorer in the Calcutta Cup games for the past 25 years. England opened a 26-3 lead as Noon scored two well-worked tries, Joe Worsley powered over in the corner and Josh Lewsey exploited a break from Mark Cueto; the latter touching over the line for a well deserved try after Barkley's break from the middle in the final minutes of the game.

In a scene that was reminiscent of last week's clash against Wales , Scotland showed a sudden surge at half time through two tries at either end of the interval courtesy of Sean Lamont and Andy Craig. Harry Ellis had an interesting time in the second half securing his first ever international try, and then moments later fed the ball to Simon Taylor who ran the better part of the pitch to secure an almost unchallenged try.

Charlie Hodgson once again left his kicking boots at home, missing 4 out of 8 kicks for goal. Although the rest of his playing was good, this game could very well be the final straw for him, and I can't see how he'll remain first choice fly half when the Autumn Internationals come round, especially given the difficulty of those games.

There were exemplary performances from many of the England players. Noon being the obvious example with 3 tries under his belt. Josh Lewsey was nothing less than excellent, and Martin Corry's captaincy appeared to definitely suit him. Thompson was great at the line out, as were the two scum halves with Matt Dawson giving England a well deserved surge after he came on.

The amount of injuries to England players became laughable by the end, with Kay, Moody, Lewsey, Thompson, Balshaw all on the ground at some point during the game. Luckily most of these injuries weren't serious.

Ollie Smith made a welcome entrance for the team after Balshaw injured himself, Andy Goode replaced Charlie Hodgson after 76 minutes. Steve Thompson was replaced by Andy Titterrell, Mike Worsley replaced a rather uninspiring Duncan Bell. Finally, Steve Borthwick and Andy Hazell replaced Kay and Moody respectively because of injuries.

England can look back on the Six Nations with some sense of pride. The team really did come so close to winning against Wales , France and Ireland . Andy Robinson could never have predicted the necessity of fielding so many uncapped England players, but that's the state of things in the injured England camp.

Sir Clive will be revealing his Lions squad in the coming weeks and don't be surprised if there are plenty of English players. Given the inexperience of many of them, for the most part, our boys did us proud this Six Nations, with flashes of brilliance from all over the team. The likes of Wilkinson, Hill, Tindall, Vickery etc should be back with us soon. All that's left to do now is for the squad to gel, build up a bit of experience, and peak around, say, October 2007.

Well done to the England boys on a great Calcutta Cup victory.

Bookmark or share this story with:

• Digg
• Delicious
• Facebook
• Reddit
• Stumbleupon

SPORTNETWORK SPECIALS