'Big gap between England and top teams' - Steve Borthwick after defeat to France
Steve Borthwick feels England need to improve further to compete against top teams
©PA
England head coach Steve Borthwick admitted that he was incredibly disappointed following his side's record defeat against France in the fourth round of the Six Nations tournament at Twickenham Stadium on Saturday.
Thibaud Flament, Charles Ollivon and Damian Penaud scored doubles after Thomas Ramos scored the opening try as the Les Bleus completed a dominating 53-10 victory.
This was also England's third heaviest defeat overall and the biggest at home and Borthwick said the performance showed how behind his side is when they compete against a top side like France.
"We're incredibly disappointed with the performance," said Borthwick.
"No one is under any illusions over what we've got to do. I think we've been pretty up front with that throughout. Today just shows, in stark reality, what that's about.
"We fell considerably short, that's the reality. My job is to make sure we learn and improve faster than any other team. We need to find a way to ensure that doesn't happen again.
"We are incredibly disappointed. We wanted to put in a really good performance for the supporters today, and we weren't able to do so. And that hurts us, and I'm sure it hurts the supporters as well.
"There will be no shortage of hard work to come out of this."
Borthwick also credited France for their consistency over the years and is now looking forward to the challenge against the top-ranked Ireland side next week.
"Immense credit to the French team, their power, pace and class showed, and it showed where the gap is. I said before the game it was a formidable challenge, and it turned out to be.
"They played exceptionally well, we played poorly. We've got to learn from it and be better. We know where we are, and we were shown just how much work we have to do.
"Today we played the second-best team in the world, and they showed just how much better they are than where we currently are, and next week we play Ireland who are the best team in the world."
