England concentrate on discipline

England appear to have backed down from threats to drop Danny Care and other players guilty of indiscipline for Sunday’s RBS 6 Nations clash with France.

Team manager Martin Johnson last week warned he was ready to wield the axe after England conceded 18 penalties and had two more players sin-binned in the 14-13 defeat to Ireland at Croke Park.

Care’s yellow card for a mindless barge on Marcus Horan – England’s 10th in just four Tests – proved the decisive moment in the game and prompted Johnson to lose his cool in the stands.

But England’s management have taken the view that individuals should not be singled out for blame and have instead focused their efforts on remedial work - both on the field and in the classroom.

Johnson called top referee Wayne Barnes into their camp last week to analyse all the penalties that have been given away, while the need for discipline was hammered home hard on the training field.

England name their team to play France tomorrow and forwards coach John Wells indicated there would not be wholesale changes.

“You have to be practical about it. If you look back at the last three games, everyone from one to 22 has perhaps been careless at some point. Young and old,” said Wells.

“Whether that’s as a result of red mist, pressure or just good play from the opposition, who knows?

“We are not just going to start jumping around and dropping people willy nilly because of that.”

The starting XV from Croke Park met for a three-day training camp in Yorkshire last week and were put through tough conditioning sessions, doing 18 repetitions to hammer home the number of penalties England conceded in Ireland.

“We all know it had got to the point where we had to look at the problem slightly differently anyway,” said Wells.

“There was a positive reinforcement. We related the conditioning work to the number of penalties we gave away in the last game.

“It meant everybody the same. Everybody suffered at the weekend so everybody did the same thing in training. You can’t just point individuals out because they have all contributed.

“It was just some running exercises which you could do any number of repetitions of and we just related it to the number of penalties we gave away in Dublin. It was a re-emphasis.”

Harlequins winger David Strettle has been called up as cover for Paul Sackey, who suffered a calf injury against Ireland.

Newcastle prop David Wilson provides the front-row cover while Leicester lock Louis Deacon has replaced the injured Tom Palmer in the England elite squad.