ENGLAND produced a vastly-improved performance which forced Wales to work hard to retain the Broadstreet Cup at Cardiff Arms Park today.

An injection of youth into a squad that included six new caps, five of them in the starting XV, made England more competitive than they were 12 months ago when Wales eased to a 36-3 win in Cardiff and gave head coach Sean Fletcher cause for optimism.

“Getting beaten in Cardiff is horrible, you will never get away from that,” Fletcher said.

“But the positive is that it was 36-3 here last year and now were are 18-5. We should have had another try and a true reflection would have been 18-10 for me. But it’s a massive step from where we were at this time last year.

“The difference is that we are competitive in our defensive and attacking line out, we are competitive in our mauling, we have now got to find the gel between the forwards and backs mix.

“That will come with more game together. When you look at where we are now to where we were that has all come with game time.We prepare better, we get together as frequently as we can.

“The Welsh guys came to me and said it was the most competitive game we have had for a long time.

“In the last 20 minutes of the last two internationals, Wales have been dominant but in the last 20 minutes today we were dominant and that is the corner we needed to turn.

“I am as proud of that last 20 minutes as I was the first 20 minutes. If we can put the points on the board early on, which we should have done, it’s a different story.”

England’s points came with the final play of the match when Hartpury College centre Cameron Roberts broke through to reward a period of sustained pressure with an unconverted try.

England were also dangerous at the start of the match but they could not find a way through a solid Wales defence and had only a missed penalty from scrum-half Ollie Fountain to show for their efforts.

Wales soaked up the pressure and made the most of their own attacking chances when they finally broke from defence with Adam Brake, their captain and number eight, being driven over from a line out.

A penalty from full back Celyn Ashton stretched the lead to 8-0 by half-time and another forward-dominated try from replacement prop Richard Jones and an Ashton conversion and penalty effectively decided the contest.

But England’s fitness is much improved this season and they did not fade as they did in their home-and-away matches against Wales last season.

Henley Hawks number eight Jake O’Leary impressed on his debut and supplied England with plentiful line out possession throughout and Roberts formed an encouraging centre pairing with Roberts.

The sin-binning of lock David Brake reduced Wales to 14 men for the closing stages and England’s persistence was eventually rewarded when the jubilant Roberts crossed and Fountain’s long range conversion attempt struck an upright.

England Deaf

15 Guy Lavery (Unattached); 14 Andrew Flook (Sheffield Hallamshire), 13 Cameron Roberts (Hartpury College), 12 Ben Jordan (Penryn), 11 Max Thorne (Dunstablians); 10 Tom Bridgeman (Kettering), 9 Ollie Fountain (Hitchin); 1 Matt Madsen (Cannock), 2 Ollie Evans (Lydney), 3 Joshua Sprules (Bletchley), 4 Barney Reed (Pulborough), 5 Kris Mannering (Guildford), 6 Aaron Beesley (Hove), 7 Luke Cheyne (Barkers Butts -captain) 8 Jake O’Leary (Henley Hawks).

Replacements used: Richie McFie (Owestry), Ryan Arbon (Hitchin), Liam Rowe (Royal Wootton Bassett), Sam Scadeng (Sutton Coldfield), Adam Faulkner (Oswestry).