RWC2025 | England head coach John Mitchell, captain Zoe Aldcroft and Mastercard Player of the Match Morwenna Talling react to their Rugby World Cup quarter-final win

England head coach John Mitchell, captain Zoe Aldcroft and Mastercard Player of the Match Morwenna Talling react to their six-try Rugby World Cup quarter-final win over Scotland at Ashton Gate Stadium on Sunday, which sets up a semi-final against France.

John Mitchell, head coach

On the performance:

"I thought it was a terrific performance in very difficult conditions. We kept them in their own half and we built pressure frequently through our set-piece. That's where we thought we could break them. There was a lot of repeated infringement towards the end so I'm not sure why penalty tries weren't awarded.

"The pressure by the team was superb. The only little glitch was conceding the line-break late in the game, which is something I don't really enjoy."

On whether he knows his preferred England starting XV:

"I definitely know, I planned it, but you don't know who you're going to come up against next. We'll always look at tactical opportunities, positional skillsets where we might get more of an advantage. But this is a whole group, not just a 23."

Morwenna Talling, Mastercard Player of the Match

On the performance:

"It was really good. Obviously the weather wasn't great but we put our best foot forward and the pack did a great job getting us go-forward."

On her own performance:

"It is always massive to play your best rugby. That's what the tournament is about. The competition only drives each of us to get better and in training it helps us every day and then to put it out in the match is great."

On how confident are the Red Roses about playing France:

"After today, very confident. We'll just put our heads back down, keep pushing hard in training and we'll come out next weekend."

Zoe Aldcroft, captain

On reaching the semi-finals:

"We are just so pleased. Conditions played a bit of a role today but we are super excited to attack this week heading into that semi-final."

On being back playing after injury ruled her out of a few pool games:

"So happy to be back with the girls, they've done me proud the last couple of weeks, but you can't beat being back on the pitch.

"There's been some awesome performances from all the girls."

On the mentality of the England team:

"We're going to keep where our feet are. We love preparing well so we'll make sure we get a good training week in to put ourselves in the best place heading into the semi-final against France."

On competition for places:

"We've got a squad of 32 girls and every single one of them is world class so it's great competition and it raises our training level."