Ben Earl insisted England wins are like London buses and once one arrives then plenty more will come in their slipstream.
The No.8 was in defiant mood on Saturday night after the 27-22 loss to Ireland which leaves England with a record of two wins in their last nine Tests – and they were both against Japan.
Privately the RFU were targeting four wins out of five in this Six Nations but that looks a pipe dream with the fixtures to come.
Antoine Dupont and his rampant France are in town next weekend and the last time they pitched up in south-west London they destroyed England 53-10.
Then, a fortnight later, Calcutta Cup holders Finn Russell and Scotland arrive – and they haven’t lost to England for five years.
But Earl sifted through the doom and gloom declaring as soon as England get one win over the line the floodgates will open.
The 27-year-old said: “That dam will break and we’ll start getting momentum. The Six Nations is about momentum, winning Test matches is about momentum.
“We just need to get one. We’ll wait till that, and we’ll keep turning up. We’ve been through a lot of hurt together but we’re not disheartened.
“That’s been the same for a number of different fixtures over the last eight or nine but at some point – and I know I keep saying this – the dam will break and we’ll start winning them. Then this whole narrative changes.”
England have a mountain climb against the French who hammered Wales 43-0 in Paris on Friday and hardly got out of second gear.
But Earl is refusing to throw the towel in saying the day England don’t want to be in tough situations really is the day to give it up.
He added: “You can either choose to just say, ‘This is rubbish’, and let it chip away at your mindset next week – and we’ve still got another four games to play.
“Or, we can say, ‘Let’s try and use it in the right way. Let’s try and learn from what we fell short on this week, grow as a team’. We can keep competing, keep evolving week on week, and we’ll see where we’re at.
“But the moment you start going, ‘This is rubbish, I’d rather not have this feeling. I’d rather not put myself in this vulnerable position’ then you don’t want to be here do you?”
Saturday’s defeat was made all the more frustrating by the way England took the game to Ireland and dominated the first 35 minutes before falling away.
They stuck to Steve Borthwick’s plan of kicking well and going after the Irish at the breakdown before collapsing in a heap. “We got into the sheds at 40 and were thinking ‘this is actually as much fun as we’ve had on the rugby pitch for a long time’,” said Earl.
“That was as good as we’ve been. I had images of that South Africa game in the semi-finals in 2023, in terms of how we fought for each other, how we ran for each other.”
