Ashton Dismisses South Africa Defeat As 'irrelevant'

Brian Ashton has dismissed suggestions that England's heavy defeat against South Africa in the Rugby World Cup group stages could have a bearing on next weekend's final should the Springboks defeat Argentina tonight.

England will become the first team to win the tournament twice in succession should they successfully defend their title following their 14-9 semi-final win over France yesterday evening. With South Africa the favorites to join Ashton's side in the final, talk is already turning to the Springboks' overwhelming 36-0 win over England in their Pool A encounter. Ashton, however, insists that the defeat came at a time when England were struggling to play well, and may yet come to represent the event's major turning point.

"If we play South Africa in the final, and that is by no means certain given the unpredictability of this tournament, that will be a complete irrelevance now," said Ashton. "What happened could be a motivating factor for us, obviously, but I think the 36-0 score margin will be a complete irrelevance just as the two games in the summer were."

England suffered huge defeats against South Africa in May and June, scoring just two tries in two games while the Springboks scored 15. But that England team was severely weakened by injuries and club commitments.

The pool stage defeat seemed to end any hope that England could win the World Cup but Ashton believes it had a significant effect on his players. "In hindsight that game came at the right time and gave us a massive kick up the backside, a wake-up call to make sure we got our act together. In many ways, that so far was the defining moment of the tournament, but since then we have won four games on the bounce and hope to make it five next week."

Ashton also admitted that he found it difficult to imagine his squad performing so well before the tournament began. "If you had asked me five weeks ago 'are you going to get to a World Cup final' I would have had to think deep and hard before I said yes," he said.

"But hindsight is a wonderful thing. You pick a squad to do a job and this squad was specifically selected to defend the World Cup and that is exactly what they are doing at the moment. It took a while to get the show on the road, as it were. Now that they are in that position it wouldn't surprise me if they completed the job."