Blood, sweat and effort: how England kept calm and carried on amid Fiji din

Ten minutes left to play in Marseille, and the game is slipping away from England, taking with it their improbable shot at winning this World Cup. They had been 14 points up just moments ago and the Stade Vélodrome was so quiet in those moments that the crowd were throwing Mexican waves. It would have been stretching the point to say you could hear a pin drop, but if you strained your ears you could hear the bones pop and the bodies flop. Then Fiji finally started to play the way only they can. In six minutes they broke the line twice and scored tries both times, 24-10 became 24-22.

The English didn’t stop to watch the conversion. They were in the one place no team want to be when there’s 10 minutes left to play, when you’re only two points up and the semi-finals are on the line. In a huddle under their own posts. Maro Itoje was there first, and already calling his exhausted teammates in to join him. Courtney Lawes was last to arrive and when he had made it Itoje pressed his finger to his lips and told everyone to shut up as Owen Farrell stepped forward. Away by the 22, Simione Kuruvoli was lining up his kick, while Farrell was talking, quietly, calmly, forcefully, about exactly how they were going to get out of this.

A blink of an eye and all of a sudden England have the ball back. Ben Earl is bullocking his way downfield, past one, two, three tacklers and Fiji are reeling backwards to their own tryline. Here’s Manu Tuilagi, wide on the left and held inches short of the line, and here’s Marcus Smith, head wrapped in bandages, the front of his jersey covered in blood, the numbers ripped clean off the back, over on the right, stopped short too. England were in arm’s reach of the tryline. In the middle of it all, here’s