The two vying fly-halves worked excellently in tandem, and even functioned well when England brought on a third in George Ford
One of the most intriguing changes to the teamsheet was the deployment of Harlequins fly-half Marcus Smith at fullback, despite his rather diminutive stature. His selection ahead of the really rather tall Freddie Steward was not merely just to rest the Leicester man – Smith was selected over others who have played 15 far more regularly, such as Max Malins and Daly.
Through his agility and vision for a gap, Smith offers a point of difference over the steady and excellent, but not quite as incisive, Steward. Clearly this tactical tweak is being considered in future matches in which England need to find an attacking edge. On the evidence of today’s match, there’s enough promise shown to consider it a risk worth taking at times, but not worthy of plan A.
Smith was deployed largely as expected, as a run-first second playmaker, operating behind an Ollie Lawrence-shaped screen in attack. He combined nicely with Arundell a few times early on, encouraging the winger to back himself against his opposite number for pace, rightly, and hitting the resulting ruck. A lovely wraparound coast-to-coast move saw him get outside his defender with ease, a try only stopped by Malins’ fumble into touch.
As the match went on he got a little squeezed by Chile’s rush in attacking scenarios. He ran back into traffic rather than get isolated, cleverly, several times, but the lack of incision against this defence was more than a little concerning. Then came the try.Smith hit a fantastic line after a turnover to take out a defender before dinking a chip and chase that had failed prior in the game, catching a rolling bobbling ball in stride having shown his pace to burn past the Chilean defenders.
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