Itoje reacts to France win: “This team is going to fight”
England captain Maro Itoje reacts to his side's dramatic win over France in the second round of the 2025 Guinness Six Nations.
Maro Itoje: "For large parts of today we were not as accurate as we wanted to be. One thing I love about this team is that we are going to fight for each other and believe in each other.
"I thought we were brave and ballsy, and that is the foundation of what we want to be going forward. Imagine how good we can be when we add that layer of accuracy on top of this fight. I am delighted for this team and for the fans - thanks for staying with us and we are going to build from here.
"This game, last game and all the games to come this team is going to show the fans how much it means. We want this to be the foundation of us. We need to be consistent throughout the game. We need to be accurate and when we have opportunities we need to capitalise on them, but what I love about this team is we are going to fight.
"Thanks so much for the support. Allianz was rocking today!"
Fin Smith: "It was back-and-forth, we have lost plenty of games like that in the past, and luckily this one went our way today. It was far from perfect but my god that group fought hard today - we kept giving ourselves another shot and another shot and we got over the line.
"We backed ourselves, we didn’t go into our shells, and we kept moving the ball. The French are an awesome outfit, they probably let us off the hook in the first half a little bit.
"I felt like a rabbit in the headlights in the first half but found my feet a little bit towards the end and I'm just delighted we got the win."
Steve Borthwick: "It was an exciting Test match, I’m really happy for the players and today was a special atmosphere.
"There is a lot of young talent in this team - the potential of this team is so high. They had courage with the ball, this team wants to score tries. It was a great Test match and I hope everyone at home enjoyed watching it."
