England captain Owen Farrell claimed everyone in the squad believes they can defeat the Springboks in the second summer Test on Saturday.
The fly-half led his team out for only the second time last week, but England couldn’t hold on to their 24-3 lead as South Africa turned the game around to triumph 42-39 in Johannesburg.
Hoping for a response in Bloemfontein to end a four-Test losing streak, Farrell emphasised there’s no need to panic.
“I don’t think anybody doesn’t believe that we’re able to win the Test match at the weekend,” said the 26-year-old.
“The last thing we should do now is panic or worry, it is about us practising how we get it right.
“We’ve had a productive week so far but just because you’ve had a productive week you can’t expect it to carry on.
“We had a good training session on Wednesday which we felt there was more control in what we were doing and we’ve got to carry on building it towards this weekend.”
Having been chosen as captain for the summer tour of the Rainbow Nation, in the absence of Dylan Hartley, Farrell feels the job is easier than it appears, but understands he must keep emotions in check on Saturday.
He added: “I don’t think being captain is probably as challenging as what people make out to be from the outside, but I’ve got a lot of players doing a lot of work here in camp.
“I thought we did get the emotion right [last week], just when the pressure came on and they started getting momentum we probably didn’t cope with it as well as we should’ve done.
“We’ve spoken a lot about that. A lot of honest conversations have gone on in a really productive way.
“The main thing for me as a captain or one of those senior leaders in the team is to make sure we’re all pulling in the right direction and we’re doing that.”
