England will know that they will have to be at the best when they tackle South Africa in their final autumn international at Twickenham on Saturday.
The Springboks will be chomping at the bit to show their 21-17 loss to Scotland was a mere blip against an England side that is gathering momentum with each passing week.
The reigning world champions have been less than impressive on their Great Britain and Ireland tour following narrow wins against both Ireland and Wales though they were still expected to overcome a determined Scotland outfit, who had lost 49-3 the previous week to New Zealand and who had not beaten the Springboks since 2002.
Their error count was unusually high at Murrayfield and they saw their hopes of a Grand Slam dashed as Dan Parks expertly punished them by kicking six penalties and a drop goal to guide Scotland to victory.
It could be argued that the world champions had let the off-field antics distract them from the task at hand.
At the beginning of the week, Bjorn Basson and Chiliboy Ralepelle were sent home for reportedly failing a drugs test, while Bryan Habana suffered a hand injury, which will also see him miss the clash with Martin Johnson’s men.
South Africa have not had much luck with injuries as John Smit, Jaque Fourie, Heinrich Brüssow, JP Pietersen, Gurthrö Steenkamp, Butch James, Ricky Januarie and Schalk Burger have all been missing with various ailments.
However, coach Peter de Villiers and several others have called for an immediate improvement from their defeat to the Scots and Johnson has shown he is taking the South African challenge seriously by naming the same starting XV that laid the foundations for England’s record 35-18 win over Australia a fortnight ago.
Lewis Moody, Mike Tindall, Tom Croft and Dan Cole all come back into the line-up after they were rested during the 26-13 victory over Samoa last week, while Matt Banahan replaces Delon Armitage on the substitutes bench in the only change from the triumph over the Wallabies.
England showed that they are an ever-improving side following the win over the South Sea Islanders.
Not many would have expected Johnson’s men to win three of their four autumn internationals, however, that is what they can achieve on Saturday and they are even favourites among some bookmakers to triumph.
A battling defeat to New Zealand preceded wins over Australia and Samoa but if England can overcome South Africa, it will be the clearest hint yet that they will fear no team in the 2011 Rugby World Cup.
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