Johnson puts brave face on England loss

12 April 2012

Martin Johnson refused to dismiss England as a "lost cause" as the curtain was brought down on a tortuous autumn with a record 32-6 defeat by New Zealand.

Dan Carter kicked 17 points as New Zealand completed their third Grand Slam tour and condemned Johnson to a trio of landslide losses in his first three games in charge.

"We turned up and played but that is the absolute minimum for us. We have to learn the lessons of this autumn heading into the Six Nations," Johnson said. "It's not a lost cause and the players will be far better for this series."

He added: "They had a kick in the teeth. It's a harsh world but they need to learn from what's happened.

"I was proud of the players' effort. We had to stand up after what happened against South Africa (when they suffered a 42-6 loss) and we did that very well.

"We gave ourselves a chance but we were just not good enough to take it. Mentally the way the players approached the week was good.

"Some guys have a lot to learn as a team - mainly that you make mistakes at this level and you get killed. The coaching team has faced some heavy and undeserved criticism and they held things together very well this week."

England were hamstrung by some appalling discipline that saw four players sin-binned and gave a string of penalties to Carter, who missed five shots at goal in a rare off-day.

The course of the match may have been altered had Nick Easter finished a chance just seconds after the interval and Johnson admitted it felt like groundhog day.

"It's getting a bit old for us to say the margins are small," he said. "We competed and both defences were on top. We made a very good attacking team look average at times, but we must improve on our second-half performances."

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