England stutter to another win

England maintained their unbeaten record against Samoa, overcoming a rugged display by the South Pacific islanders to win 26-13 in a bruising battle at Twickenham on Saturday.

Second-half tries from Matt Banahan and Tom Croft and 16 points from flyhalf Toby Flood secured victory for England, who struggled to reproduce the scintillating form of their win over Australia against a physical Samoan side.

Samoa, beaten 20-10 by Ireland in Dublin last week, scored with tries in the first and last minutes of the second half - by fullback Paul Williams and late replacement Fautua Otto respectively.

England captain Nick Easter said his side had failed to finish as ruthlessly as they had against the Wallabies a week earlier.

"We weren't as clinical as we wanted to be," Easter said.

"It was the right result but not the right performance," added Easter, filling in as skipper for the rested Lewis Moody, who is expected to return for England's final autumn international against South Africa next week.

A bruising first half had seen England fall behind to a penalty from Williams after only three minutes.

Williams could have extended Samoa's lead three minutes later but his second shot at goal drifted wide.

Gradually however England's superiority at the set piece - with their scrum particularly dominant - began to tell.

England had a try disallowed by the video referee after fullback Ben Foden dotted down in the corner only to be adjudged to have left his trailing leg in touch on 11 minutes.

The home side finally got back on level terms on 16 minutes however when the first of several first-half Samoan infringements at the scrum presented Flood with his first penalty of the afternoon to make it 3-3.

England's relentless pressure looked to have earned them a try on 24 minutes when centre Shontayne Hape sent Chris Ashton clear under the posts. However, Hape's pass was ruled forward.

Instead it was left to Flood to kick England into the lead with another penalty on 27 minutes after Samoa were penalised for going off their feet at a ruck to make it 6-3 at half-time.

England were rocked in the first minute of the second half however, when a superb turnover by Samoan replacement Iosefa Tekori saw the ball swept wide for Williams to score in the corner to make it 8-6.

The Samoan try galvanised England, however, and they re-established their lead two minutes later.

A clever decoy run by Banahan allowed Hape to break clear near the Samoan 22 and feed the overlapping Ashton, who then passed inside to Banahan who touched down under the posts giving Flood a routine conversion for a 13-8 lead.

England thought they had extended their lead midway through the half when Banahan crashed over after a sweeping move only for Cueto, England's best runner throughout, to have been ruled just in touch.

Two more Flood penalties made it 19-8 going into the final 10 minutes, where England began to turn the screw.

Banahan intercepted a loose pass from scrumhalf Kahn Fotuali'i and offloaded superbly to Hape who burst clear and flicked inside to Croft, who had replaced Tom Haskell moments earlier to score under the posts.

Flood added the conversion but Samoa were able to cut the deficit in the final minute when replacement Fautua Otto touched down in the corner.

The scorers:

For England:
Tries: Banahan, Croft
Cons: Flood 2
Pens: Flood 4

For Samoa:
Tries: Williams, Otto
Cons: Williams

Teams:

England: 15 Ben Foden, 14 Chris Ashton, 13 Matt Banahan, 12 Shontayne Hape, 11 Mark Cueto, 10 Toby Flood, 9 Ben Youngs, 8 Nick Easter (captain), 7 Hendre Fourie, 6 James Haskell, 5 Tom Palmer, 4 Courtney Lawes, 3 David Wilson, 2 Dylan Hartley, 1 Andrew Sheridan. 
Replacements: 16 Steve Thompson, 17 Dan Cole, 18 David Attwood, 19 Tom Croft, 20 Danny Care, 21 Charlie Hodgson, 22 Delon Armitage.

Samoa: 15 Paul Williams, 14 David Lemi, 13 George Pisi, 12 Seilala Mapusua, 11 Alesana Tuilagi, 10 Tasesa Lavea, 9 Kahn Fotuali'i, 8 George Stowers, 7 Manaia Salavea, 6 Ofisa Trevarinus, 5 Kane Thompsen, 4 Filipo Lavea Levi, 3 Anthony Perenise, 2 Mahonri Schwalger (captain), 1 Sakaria Taulafo.
Replacements: 16 Ti'i Paulo, 17 Census Johnston, 18 Iosefa Tekori, 19 Afa Aiono, 20 Junior Poluleuligaga, 21 Fautua Otto, 22 Fautua Otto.

Referee: Peter Fitzgibbon (Ireland)
Assistant referees: Alan Lewis (Ireland), Cobus Wessels (South Africa)
TMO: Giulio De Santis (Italy)