First the good news: by Saturday night the Six Nations will be over and England's dispiriting campaign will have been laid to rest in a shallow Parisian grave. No more worthy tripe dressed up as significant progress, no more fumbling for fresh adjectives to describe the same old dross. Even if England somehow stop France securing a grand slam, it will not elevate their season above the deeply mediocre.
For the world's richest union this is, once again, an uncomfortable place to be. Even Martin Johnson, to his credit, declined to spin the unspinnable. His team may have clung on to the Calcutta Cup with this barely deserved draw but they are trapped in a black hole creatively, as far removed from a revitalised world force as when Johnson took over. Avoiding defeat in another tryless exercise in futility – England's last try in Scotland came six years ago – is nothing to shout about.
Most worrying of all is that Johnson's men, challenged by him to outdo the Scots for energy, urgency, passion and emotion, could not do so. If the same happens at the Stade de France against opponents who ripped Italy to shreds yesterday, it will be carnage. "It can be a very long night in Paris if you don't get it right," said Johnson, looking as deflated as he has done in months. From somewhere he has to inject impetus and acknowledge that his side are worryingly short of real quality.
The issues go far beyond a temporary loss of confidence. The only area of the team which has shown up well in the past few weeks has been the scrummage, under Graham Rowntree's tutelage. If there is an English player of the championship it is Dan Cole, whose Test career is in its infancy. There is a moral there somewhere: rather than soldiering on with willing but limited club stalwarts and settling for damage limitation Johnson simply has to shed his innate selectorial caution. No one is suggesting he take half a dozen teenagers to Paris but the painful head knocks suffered by Jonny Wilkinson and Ugo Monye (happily neither suffered lasting damage) offer an excuse to experiment. Ben Foden and Chris Ashton should start and with Mathieu Bastareaud in mind there is a case for inviting Shontayne Hape to add some edge to England's midfield.
Toby Flood deserves an opportunity at No10 but it would be good to see Ben Youngs and Shane Geraghty combine in an attempt to shake England out of their torpor. For that to happen, quick ball will be needed and pace has to be injected up front. Courtney Lawes, Matt Mullan, Steffon Armitage, Phil Dowson … there is no longer any point waiting until the summer tour to Australia to discover what they can do. What price, too, another look at the captaincy? Steve Borthwick has been unfairly maligned at times but England's hangdog demeanour away from Twickenham has not been the greatest advert for his powers of inspiration. The only snag is the shortage of alternatives: Nick Easter, Dylan Hartley and Dowson all have their qualities in the absence of Tom Rees, perhaps the best long-term option.
And Wilkinson? It might be wisest to send him back to the south of France to recuperate and reflect. If one passage of play summed up his and England's current uncertainty, it came in the first quarter. For once there was a glimmer of space out wide, only for Wilkinson to ignore the simple option of putting Riki Flutey through a hole next to him and throw a looping pass over Hartley's head and into touch instead. Wilkinson will go down in history as someone who shattered the fly-half mould but he is not the reassuring presence he used to be.
Watching France at play yesterday was to be reminded of the disappointingly uneven quality of this year's Six Nations. On Saturday Scotland played by far the brighter rugby but they rarely threatened the England line, a Cole tackle on Chris Cusiter snuffing out their best chance. Even a tiresome succession of collapsed scrums, however, could not extinguish Andy Robinson's glow of satisfaction, his team having fed off an emotional pre-match address by the injured wing Thom Evans, who presented Dan Parks with his jersey to mark the latter's 50th cap.
Parks, who kicked four penalties and a drop goal and saw two penalty attempts bounce off uprights, would have loved to secure Scotland's first victory of the championship. But it was England who mounted the more dangerous late rally. Flood hit the top of the goalpost padding with a penalty effort from halfway and then had a drop-goal attempt charged down to ensure the first draw between the countries since 1989, when Robinson was on the openside flank for the English.
"I thought the referee should have been stronger," said the former Bath man. The same could be said of England.
Scotland Southwell (Stade Français; Danielli, Ulster, 67); S Lamont (Scarlets), De Luca (Edinburgh), Morrison (Glasgow), M Evans (Glasgow); Parks (Glasgow; Godman, Edinburgh, 72), Cusiter (Glasgow, capt; R Lawson, Gloucester, 61); Jacobsen (Edinburgh; Cross, Edinburgh, 72), Ford (Edinburgh; S Lawson; Gloucester, 65), Murray (Northampton), Hamilton (Edinburgh; Hines, Leinster, 52), Kellock (Glasgow), Brown (Glasgow; MacDonald, Edinburgh, 56), Barclay, Beattie (both Glasgow).
Pens Parks 4 Drop goal Parks.
England D Armitage (London Irish; Foden, Northampton, 50); Cueto (Sale), Tait (Sale), Flutey (Brive), Monye (Harlequins; Youngs, Leicester, 56); Wilkinson (Toulon; Flood, Leicester, 45), Care (Harlequins); Payne (Wasps), Hartley (Northampton; Thompson, Brive, 62), Cole (Leicester; Wilson, Bath, 77), L Deacon (Leicester; Lawes, Northampton, 74), Borthwick (Saracens, capt), Haskell (Stade Français; Moody, Leicester, 62), Worsley (Wasps), Easter (Harlequins).
Pens Wilkinson 3, Flood 2.
Referee M Jonker (South Africa) Attendance 66,891.
