Warren Gatland and Stuart Lancaster have both admitted that England’s decision to go for the try instead of taking the three points from a penalty kick late in the game yesterday proved pivotal as Wales saw out a famous 28-25 win at Twickenham last night.
With the clock nearing the 80-minute mark England captain Chris Robshaw admitted that it was his own decision rather than the management team to opt for touch instead of going for the points that would have seen the score tied at 28-28.
“On the field it’s the players making the decisions and it was a big call to go for the corner,” said Lancaster.
“The call came down to myself,” said captain Chris Robshaw.
“We wanted to go for a win – unfortunately it didn’t come off.
“It hurts like hell at the moment and we feel we have let a lot of people down when we were in a prominent position.”
Wales head coach Gatland also believed that England made the wrong decision, with the Welsh coach clearly thrilled with the victory as he was seen celebrating at the full-time whistle.
“I thought they would have gone for goal and taken the draw,” Gatland said.
“It’s a big call to make and a brave call to make.
“They’d caught us out in the past… throwing to the front of the line-out and we expected that, and did a good job in stopping that driven maul and pushed them into touch.
“Those are decisions you make sometimes and you go there and you get a driven line-out and you win the game and you’re a hero, you make the wrong call and you’re zero.
“There were two good sides out there. I have a lot of respect for England – their players and their management – and that game could have gone either way.”
Poor discipline cost England dearly after leading in the second-half 19-9 thanks to a try from Jonny May, but a fantastic counter-attack from Wales saw Hallam Amos’ replacement in scrum-half Lloyd Williams kick through for Gareth Davies to score under the posts.
Dan Biggar also continued his fine goal-kicking form with 23 points from his boot helping Wales earn a fantastic victory that now puts them in the driving seat in Pool A with England needing to record a victory over Australia if they are to have any hope in qualifying.
“I’m so frustrated to have allowed Wales back into the game in the way we did,” said Lancaster. “We’ve talked a lot about discipline and breakdown penalties, and we gave some dumb ones away which kept them in the game.
“We were going well but ill-discipline from us and Dan Biggar’s great goal-kicking kept them in the game, and from there they got the try and suddenly it was 28-25.”
However, the hard-earned victory came at a cost for Wales as the injury crisis took another turn for the worse with centre Scott Williams, full-back Liam Williams and winger Hallam Amos all being forced off to add to the already bloated injury list that includes Leigh Halfpenny, Rhys Webb and Cory Allen.
“We lost another couple of players. Hallam Amos has dislocated his shoulder. We’re running out of players in Wales,” Gatland added.
“We have such a small pool of players and they worked so hard. I’m absolutely so proud of them.
“The pleasing thing for me was that we looked the stronger team in that last 10 or 15 minutes and that’s testament to the hard work that has gone into this group of guys.
“The celebrations in the changing room were amazing.”
And Wales captain Sam Warburton praised the fighting attitude of his side despite the significant absentees.
“Wow what an unbelievable result. I think it was two very evenly-matched sides and I always knew there was never going to be more than seven points in this match, it was going to go to the wire,” said the open-side flanker.
“Credit to England, they threw absolutely everything at us, they played really well and we had to be at our best in defence and gave a few too many penalties away.
“But I’m just lost for words, it was an amazing win.
“We’ve been in this position a few times at half-time. We might not be leading but we back the fitness work we did in the summer, knowing that in the last 20 minutes we can come through strong.”
