ENGLAND scrum coach Neal Hatley declared himself satisfied with the nation’s unprecedented forwards training session against Wales at Clifton College, Bristol, on Monday.

The session, brokered by former Bristol Rugby pack boss Steve Borthwick and Wales national coach Warren Gatland, involved the two countries getting down to business in scrums and line-outs as a way of firing them up ahead of their respective Autumn Test Series matches which start this weekend.

England national coach Eddie Jones wanted his forwards to give Wales some real stick during the session as he looks to sharpen them before they play Argentina at Twickenham on Saturday.

The fierce rivals locked horns to complete 12 scrums and 16 line-outs over a forty-minute session which, to see there was fair play and the two sets of packs did not start brawling amongst themselves, was overseen by international referee Nigel Owens.

The session had been dubbed the ‘Battle of Bristol’ by England prop Harry Williams beforehand.

And Hatley declared: “It was good, very worthwhile. It was good to get live competition early in the week and we gained a lot from it.

“We want to make training as competitive as possible so the unfamiliarity of it made this session different. Obviously it was against players we don’t come up against week in week out.

“There was a little bit of an edge, but there was nothing serious. Both sides took a lot from it.It was a training aid to help us prepare so there was good edge to it.”

Hatley remained quiet on who got the upper hand in the session, saying: “We’ll look at the video and take it from there!

“We got what we wanted to out of it, putting into practice things that we’d been looking at during our training camp in Portugal last week.

“It sets us up nicely to play Argentina, who are a good set-piece team, so in that respect it was handy.”

The session took place behind closed doors but former Thornbury Bronco prop Mako Vunipola, now with Saracens, would have taken an active part.