Joe Marler says the current England squad is the tightest he can remember with “much less in-house bitching” in the wake of Saturday’s defeat to Scotland.
England were beaten 20-17 by the Scots at Murrayfield, which means they have kicked off their Six Nations campaign with a defeat.
Eddie Jones’ side are looking to bounce straight back this weekend when they travel Italy, who also lost their opening game to France.
Harlequins prop Marler has praised the reaction in camp and says the group have kept calm in the wake of their defeat to Scotland.
“With this group it is probably the tightest group I have been a part of, with a lot of the youngsters, who are very good friends off the pitch, and the older heads coming together a bit, so it is very tight,” said Marler.
“And the way we have responded to it has been much less in-house bitching as there may have been in the past.
“It has actually been a pretty level response. We did so many good things in that game but these little execution pieces we didn’t quite get right and we need to work on.
“So it is never as bad as we think it is and it is never as good as we think it is, so it is a pretty level response we have had from the group which is pleasing.
“With the new generation of player coming through there has had to be a bit of an adaption from the staff, and also from the older boys, that the old hierarchical system that may have worked in rugby previously, just doesn’t work that much now.
“It is more about open communications, honest communications, appropriate communications with the youngsters, and finding different ways to connect with them rather than the old school ‘here’s a stick’, so to speak - I don’t mean people getting beaten with a stick, it is a turn of phrase.”
