England captain Maro Itoje backs Steve Borthwick amid toxic culture claims

While Borthwick's side are revelling in their 45-22 win over Australia last weekend, the coach and captain had to field questions about a recent Times report claiming all was not well within the camp.

Borthwick strongly denied the report, before captain Itoje also spoke in his defence.

"Clearly, I'm not going to respond to that," the coach said. "It's not the environment I recognise, it's not an accurate reflection."

Itoje then interjected: "Sorry, could I just add to that?

"Particularly from a player's point of view, we have full support in Steve. I've had the privilege of Steve being my coach from 2016, with a little gap in his Leicester years, and that's not the man I recognise. The article doesn't represent the environment I recognise.

"I think if you speak to players over his coaching career, they will say a different story," he added.

"You think about players from other countries. If you speak to some of those guys on the 2017 Lions tour, they'll tell you about the impact Steve had on them, and those guys aren't English. I'm talking about the Irish guys, I'm talking about the Welsh guys, who he had the pleasure of coaching and having an influence on."

Itoje also tried to take the heat off his coach and put it squarely on himself and his teammates.

"As always, there are things that we want to get right, things that we try and put on the field, and sometimes for whatever reason it doesn't quite click. I think often too much criticism is attached to the coach, whereas no matter how well Steve coaches us, we as players are the ones on the field. We as players are the ones who have to perform. And there have been times where we haven't quite done that, which has put a bit of pressure on him.

"He's a world-class coach and we're lucky to have him."

Asked whether the criticism had galvanised the squad, Itoje said criticism is part of the job, but the squad doesn't need it to get motivation.

"It's never nice getting criticism," he said. "Criticism is part of the game, though. If we were scared of criticism, we wouldn't be here. We would never run out and never play. It comes with the territory."

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