England’s women celebrated the 100th cap of their fly-half Katy Daley-Mclean with an emphatic victory over the USA at Allianz Park last night in miserable, rainy conditions in north London. But Simon Middleton’s new-look team had unexpected help with the USA reduced to 14 players for 65 minutes of the game after the referee, Hollie Davidson, showed the American prop Megan Rom a red card for a high tackle.
The Americans were always going to struggle with 15 players and the powerful England forwards gave the side a platform to score nine tries in the first of three autumn home internationals. Daley-Mclean ended the evening with 17 points, including a spectacular try, before being replaced on the hour by Zoe Harrison. Although the conditions on Saracens’ plastic pitch made running rugby difficult, England ruthlessly exploited their numerical advantage.
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Daley-Mclean was the first to leave the warmth of the dressing room for the cold rain sweeping around Barnet as an expectant England looked for a repeat of the result of these sides’ last meeting in a pool game at the World Cup last year, when they beat the Americans 47-26.
The England scrum was soon causing the Eagles problems and the forwards gave the scrum-half, Leanne Riley, the chance to dart over for the first try of the night which Daley-Mclean converted from close to the posts. The USA’s night soon got worse when Rom left the pitch in tears for hitting one of England’s new caps, Sarah Beckett, in the neck with an elbow as the Waterloo No 8 tried to tackle her.
Sarah McKenna took a fine, flat pass from Daley-Mclean and used her tricky footwork to score a second converted try. For five minutes either side of the interval the USA had to cope with 13 players. Their captain, the flanker Kate Zachary, was shown a yellow card for bringing down a rolling maul after Abbie Scott, the England leader, had taken a lineout and the pack rumbled forwards. A penalty try was awarded.
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Daley-Mclean, with a neat break and the hint of a forward pass,then gave Scott the opportunity to touch down under the posts and England were out of sight. On the stroke of half-time Daley-Mclean had her biggest moment of the night, intercepting a loose pass and running in the fifth try from her 10-metre line.
England’s squad captain, Sarah Hunter, came on in the second half and was denied a try only by a decision of the video referee as the Eagles struggled to cope with a driving wind in their faces as well as a dominant home pack. Hunter was disappointed again moments later when she was penalised for a double movement at the base of a scrum.
The tries kept coming, though. From a scrum Kelly Smith cut in from the left wing and England were 40 points to the good. Hunter finally got her try when she picked the ball at the base of an advancing scrum. Harrison’s lofted kick almost gave Carys Williams a debut try but she was denied by some desperate defence.
Vicky Fleetwood was held up over the line by replacement Megan Foster before another replacement Jennine Duncan scored a well-taken consolation try on her first international appearance. Smith scored her second and Williams rounded things off with the final try of the night.
It has been a bad week for the USA, who conceded 67 points to New Zealand in Chicago last weekend. But England are on course for a clean sweep of wins this month if they continue in this vein. Their pack, schooled by the new forwards coach, Richard Blaze, are stronger than ever as the seven forwards of the Americans discovered to their cost. Not surprisingly, Daley-Mclean was named player of the match.