One player who stole the spotlight and perhaps inked their name on the cast list for opening night is fly-half Zoe Harrison.
One of four players to keep their starting spot from the win over Spain, Harrison did not let seeing her first conversion rebound off the posts to put her off.
A large part of England’s success in France came through kicking for the corner, dominating the line-out then rolling a maul over the tryline. Harrison’s kicking was pinpoint and lengthy, allowing the plan to function.
Holly Aitchison has been the main rival for the 10 shirt in recent years, but Harrison has definitely put her best foot forward in the run up to the World Cup.
Other spots are uncertain. Only one of the six tries was scored by a back – centre Megan Jones. Given their wealth of riches in that area, they should produce more.
And of course we have been here before. During the last World Cup England were on a long winning run and reliant on tries scored via forward power. They will need to find other routes in August and September.
There are players to return. Wing Claudia Moloney-MacDonald and Aitchison, contenders for starting spots in a first-choice backline, are still managing knocks, as is veteran centre Emily Scarratt, who suffered a head injury before her fifth World Cup.
Mitchell may be asking for daily medical updates on those three.
Among the forwards, it was all positive in the south of France. Following such a dominant display and some standout moments from open-side Sadia Kabeya, it will be fascinating to see if Marlie Packer returns to the back row.
The 35-year-old flanker is a Red Roses legend, but was not missed amid a suspension because of her red card against Spain.
After the match Mitchell highlighted the performances of prop Maud Muir, Kabeya and his captain Zoe Aldcroft, who also praised try-scorer Muir.
“Maud is a fantastic player,” Aldcroft said. “She’s an absolute bulldozer in attack, and in the scrum as well she’s formidable. She’s very quick, deceptively quick, and very powerful.”
As far as headaches go, there are only fairly mild ones for Mitchell. A few things to tidy up, with a mind on those painful final losses to New Zealand, but these are minor script tweaks, not a full rewrite.
He added: “We’re going to be thrown a lot of challenges when the tournament starts so we’ve just got be ready for anything and to be able to adapt, and the girls have managed this particular week very, very well.
“It’s a privilege to have pressure. We’ve earnt it over the three-year cycle so it’s not something we are going to walk away from, we’re going to walk towards it.”
When the 2025 World Cup final comes around on 27 September in Twickenham there is every reason for England fans to hope and expect their team will be there – and can extend their winning streak to 1,050 days.
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