Steve Borthwick insists England planted the seeds for future success in their brave 16-15 World Cup semi-final defeat by South Africa.
England took the lead against the Springboks on two minutes in Paris and held their advantage until two minutes from the final whistle.
The defending champions edged the Red Rose men out at the last however, as they booked a spot in the final against New Zealand.
England Captain Owen Farrell slotted four penalties and one monster drop-goal, only for RG Snyman to power in for a try.
Handre Pollard banged over a nerveless last-ditch penalty to break English hearts, the fly-half that Borthwick signed for Leicester coming back to bite him at the death.
But Borthwick has turned a miserable mess at the end of Eddie Jones’ tenure into a gritty, focused group in just 10 months.
And despite England’s agonising exit, the 43-year-old can look forward to complete RFU backing for the start of a new World Cup cycle.
“We came here tonight to win a game to go to the World Cup final, and we’ve fallen short,” said Borthwick.
“I think we all truly believed we could do it, we were going to do it, and we came very close to doing so.
“In adversity, in these tough times, there’s usually some seed of it there that will grow and be something brilliant in the future.
“Right now it’s too early for me to find that seed, but we’ll make sure we find it.
“We’ll make sure that we take some of what we find tonight, some of what we’ve gone through tonight, we’ll make sure we grab that and we’ll make sure it makes us stronger in the future.”
South Africa were bested in every aspect for the first hour, as England ripped into the shocked 2019 World Cup winners.
Fly-half Mannie Libbok was hooked after just half an hour, while the rest of the Boks bench were thrown on at the top of the second half.
The Boks claimed scrum dominance in the closing stages, winning four straight set-piece penalties that ultimately undid England.
Siya Kolisi was sitting on the bench by the time Pollard slotted the winning penalty. The Boks captain had total conviction that Pollard would deliver.
“I had no doubt at all that Handre would make the kick, he’s done that for us before,” said Kolisi.
“England are a world-class team and completely different from a year ago.
“They had an amazing gameplan, which we took too long to adapt to.
“These things happen but we dug deep to get the victory. Other teams wouldn’t be able to get the win from this.
“I’m not going to say it was ugly, we did what was needed.”
