This is a side in the throes of a rebuild, but their holy trinity of winger Katie Corrigan, flanker Aoife Wafer and fly-half O’Brien were dissolved by a wall of white. The veteran Red Roses centre engineered a sublime hack upfield that unleashed a racing Kildunne for her third.Ī young Ireland side showed flashes of their improvement but were no match for England. When the excellent Tatyana Heard – whose deep angled offloads to Holly Aitchison outfoxed Ireland all game – made way for Emily Scarratt on the hour mark, the tempo ceased to drop. Even as Mitchell unloaded his bench, his personnel continued blooming. It is a mark of this superhuman England side that they showed no signs of wilting. In a sobering snapshot of her elusiveness, she made more than 190 metres before the break. England’s lethal try-scoring machine, whose trio of scores brought her championship total up to nine, spent the entire afternoon snake-hipping her way through green shirts in a performance that illustrated why she can realise her ambition of becoming “the best player in the world”. So too, was the speed at which the Red Roses recycled the ball from a lineout deep in the red zone in the build-up to Kildunne’s first. Few can match what she provides on both sides of the ball and her 48th-minute try – bulldozing her way over from close range – was no less than she deserved. At 22-years-old, the blindside flanker has already singled herself out as a leader of this Red Roses side, having captained England at points throughout this campaign and shown her versatility by playing on both flanks. Their forwards were in full flight, with Sadia Kabeya delivering a standout performance that saw her being deployed as an effective distributor in the outside channels. The manner in which England continued to carve open Ireland was further confirmation of how they have moved away from their maul-heavy game. By the time Sophie Ellis-Bextor took centre stage with a half-time performance of ‘Murder on The Dancefloor’, it was 38-3. Soon after Meg Jones and Zoe Aldcroft finished under the posts. Lark Atkin-Davies’ direct run to set up Dow’s opener was emulated by Natasha Hunt’s break moments later, a move which the scrum-half finished off herself as she sniped over the whitewash (Hunt enjoyed one of her sharpest performances in an England shirt). It was a microcosm of Ireland’s torrid defensive effort – the visitors missed 61 tackles compared to England’s six – but it was the manner in which the hosts went about carving open the floundering green machine that was most impressive. The winger showed her innate strength to score near identical tries in the corner after shrugging off Lauren Delaney and Brittany Hogan. They set about painting a tapestry on the hallowed Twickenham turf and barely dropped any stitches, their colourful attack creating hat-tricks for Abby Dow and Ellie Kildunne as well as two tries apiece for Jess Breach and Meg Jones as their phenomenal back-line reigned supreme.ĭow’s first two scores dovetailed a relentless first half that yielded half-a-dozen tries.

While at times the atmosphere felt palpably flatter than the headline Grand Slam fixture against France last year, on the pitch England’s performance never waned. His side were undeniably energised by the attendance. “If we can continue to produce performances like that it won’t be too long before we do fill all the little green seats at the top.”

“We’ve got a drive to fill the stadium on a consistent basis because we want to play here consistently,” said the New Zealander. Yet John Mitchell, the head coach, was unequivocal in his belief that the Red Roses fanbase would only continue to swell. You wonder whether the bumper attendances will keep coming if England are going to continually slaughter opposition with such ease. They never had a chance to build on that momentum after being pulverised by an England outfit who looked even more dangerous than usual on the wide pitch in front of a 48,778-strong crowd. It seemed almost cruel that Ireland were facing the domineering Red Roses so soon after their ego-boosting win over Wales last week. Given the way this team is playing, that looks unlikely. They will go to Bordeaux next week where only their French neighbours will be able to thwart their hopes of landing a sixth consecutive Six Nations title. This was a Twickenham training session for England, who delivered a ruthless performance at the home of English rugby with a 14-try thumping of Ireland.

Artificial red roses