\n<\/p>\n
The pair’s exchange has become a running in-camp gag in the build-up to England’s final-round meeting with France on Saturday, with Smith, 5ft 11in, 13st 13lb and 15 caps, joking that he and Itoje, 6ft 5in, 18st 8lb, 101 caps, would settle a difference of opinion physically, rather than verbally, next time.<\/p>\n
“I thought it was funny,” said Smith. “Me and Maro have been joking about it this week and I told him if he shouts at me like that again, I’m going to punch him!”<\/p>\n
Itoje, usually a composed presence on and off the pitch, insisted his raised voice was not a lost temper.<\/p>\n
“I didn’t really lose it!” he laughed. “You don’t often see me with a mic. I’m not always mic’d up but maybe I’m portraying a false image.<\/p>\n
“Fin is my guy. The way I try to do things is to hear what my key decision-makers think of what is going on, and whoever plays 10 will obviously have an important role in that.<\/p>\n
“It’s a good thing that people in the team feel they can express a view, and in sport, if anything, that’s the most kosher of fallouts that the world has ever seen. <\/p>\n
“We have had far more blunt conversations between ourselves and other team-mates.”<\/p>\n
England have had cause for frank discussions during this Six Nations after three successive defeats left their title aspirations in tatters.<\/p>\n
Another against France would mean England finish with a return of one win from a Six Nations campaign for the first time since the tournament expanded in 2000.<\/p>\n
England have only lost four games in a single edition of the 143-year-old championship twice previously – in 1972 and 1976.<\/p>\n
Smith, who made his first England start in the victory over France last year at the beginning of a 12-match winning streak, is in an unfamiliar position.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The pair’s exchange has become a running in-camp gag in the build-up to England’s final-round meeting with France on Saturday, with Smith, 5ft 11in, 13st 13lb and 15 caps, joking that he and Itoje, 6ft 5in, 18st 8lb, 101 caps, would settle a difference of opinion physically, rather than verbally, next time. “I thought it<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10404,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10403","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rugby"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10403\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10404"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}