Marcus Smith shines, England trounce Italy

England have shown the ruthless streak demanded by coach Eddie Jones as they atoned for their shattering collapse against Scotland by outclassing Italy 33-0 at the Stadio Olimpico.

Jones had urged his team to "light up Rome" on Sunday and, in response, they delivered a five-try rout orchestrated by man-of-the-match Marcus Smith to inflict a 34th successive Championship defeat on the hapless Azzurri.

England had stormed 21-0 ahead by halftime and Smith was at the heart of many of their best moments, but he truly shone when firing a superb missed pass to provide Elliot Daly with a simple try in the 45th minute.

And unlike at Murrayfield a week earlier, when he was replaced in the 63rd minute to widespread puzzlement, there was no sign of George Ford arriving off the bench until late on and, this time, it was Joe Marchant who made way.

Ben Youngs eventually joined him at half-back to equal Jason Leonard's record as England's most capped player on 114 appearances, with the round-three visit of Wales to Twickenham the likely setting for him to surpass the milestone.

But, having replaced the impressive Harry Randall, Youngs entered a team that were in the midst of losing their way as Italy discovered renewed purpose to spend long spells camped in opposition territory, albeit with little end product.

An England side showing six changes in personnel following their Calcutta Cup setback struggled to reimpose themselves, taking some gloss off the victory.

It took just nine minutes for England to get off the mark when Max Malins and Smith combined for the fly-half to score.

After big carries from Nick Isiekwe and Maro Itoje shoved Italy's pack backwards, Jamie George was next to burrow over from close range and the first half