When people describe English rugby as being in a state of limbo they are correct in more ways than one. How much lower can some reputations go? In a morning statement rushed out in response to the torrent of confidential post-Rugby World Cup details leaked to the Times, the harassed Professional Game Board chairman Ian Metcalfe used the words "disappointing" and "frustrating". Had he picked "horrendously embarrassing" and "utterly mortifying" instead, he would still have understated the case.

For to call this a leak is not, strictly, accurate. It is more of a tidal wave, a gushing stream of home truths that reflect appallingly on the majority of those involved in England's Rugby World Cup campaign in New Zealand. Even the mundane stuff is, in its own way, back page dynamite. "To go into World Cup games not having a game-plan, any structure or clear idea of what we were going to do in attack was astonishing," said one player. "I really can't believe we lasted as long as we did in the tournament. We played like crap," admitted another. The days of blaming the media for writing unkind things about the team's performances appear to be finally over.

Not all the complaints would stand up to prolonged scrutiny in a court of law. In 101 pages of interviews and comments, some good stuff has clearly been trodden underfoot in the rush to highlight the steel toe-capped bits. The "fair and balanced recommendations" which the PGB is hoping to deliver to the RFU's management board on 30 November would appear, however, to be a remote prospect. It is no longer a question of how many coaches and players retain their highly-paid positions within the national squad as how many can possibly survive such a poisonous bout of in-fighting.

Listen to the players' views – or, at least, some of them – on their coaches. "It reached a stage where each time we won a game we joked that we had saved a couple of the coaches' jobs again," said one squad member in response to the Rugby Players' Association survey of the players. "The standard of attack coaching and defence coaching was poor. Substandard to coaching at my club. The coaches seemed to have the same blueprint for every game. They didn't seem to grasp that every opposition would play differently. Some of the coaches have no feel for the game." Even more wounding was one of his colleagues: "The coaches' philosophy on how to play the game was very different. The coaches really hate each other."

The nub of it, in the view of many of the players, was that too many of Martin Johnson's management team were out of their depth. Again the anonymous verdicts are damning. "At our club there is a brutally honest policy. If you mess up, you are bollocked and understand you have let your team-mates down. In England there was a no-blame/excuse culture where you swept things under the carpet," said one player. "We got the French [quarter-final] week completely wrong. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday we trained in the morning and had the afternoon and evening off. X asked why we weren't training at the same time as we were due to play in order to acclimatise but that was ignored."

Could it possibly get any worse? Of course. "There was a culture where it was not cool to train hard. What happened to the culture where everyone was training to be the best in the world?" asked one player plaintively. The verdict of some players on Lewis Moody's captaincy was withering.

"We didn't really have a good captain. I think Johno liked [Lewis] Moody as he left the team talks to Johno. He wasn't very good at team talks, just fucked a lot." Or this: "There was a time when Lewis was going to address the squad and say it was unacceptable to behave the way they had done in Queenstown and get into the state Tindall did. But then X came in and said: 'I don't see what the problem is with having a few drinks, the press are just against us and making a mountain out of a molehill.' Of course, as soon as a senior player had said that, other players agree. Moodos had lost the moment to be able to dictate to the squad."

Selection, among other things, was also a disaster, according to onlookers. "They selected [Lewis] Moody ahead of [Tom] Wood despite Moodos being half-fit and Woody playing awesomely in training and in the Six Nations." Some in the squad were also baffled when Harlequins' Chris Robshaw was omitted from the squad having been outstanding in summer training. Ben Youngs, according to some eye-witnesses, was barely fit and the recall of Jonny Wilkinson at No10 was far from universally popular. "Jonny Wilkinson is not an attacking threat any more. We really needed [Toby] Flood because he is the one who bosses the team. Floody was part of the reason England played well in the Six Nations."

It all makes deeply depressing reading for anyone who naively thought Johnson's England might have a chance of doing something special in New Zealand. Even without the off-field distractions, it is apparent the whole expedition was doomed before it even began. Only now, it seems, are those involved acknowledging there is something deeply rotten within the culture of the RFU's elite player squad which cannot be healed simply by the appointment of a new coach or two.

Because if the coaches and myriad RFU officials come out of it abysmally, the players should also be aware how unflatteringly this review paints them. Only a few, it seems, have the self-awareness to realise how badly wrong it all went. "We can't just blame the coaches for the predicament we got in. Look at France, they couldn't stand their coach and they almost won the World Cup," admitted one player. The comparisons with a focused, united Wales are even worse. "It's our own fault we came back so unpopular," wrote one player sadly. At least no one can now accuse the RFU of brushing stuff under the carpet. It must do whatever it takes to ensure this damning, shameful postmortem is the lowest point in Twickenham's turbulent history.