England power away from Italy to secure dominant 40-9 win

Pegged back to a slender 11-9 advantage at the end of the first half despite George Ford's 25th minute try, a second half hat-trick from outside centre Jonathan Joseph propelled Jones' side to a victory at the Stadio Olimpico, a result that puts them in charge of the nascent Six Nations table.

Owen Farrell - who briefly left the field in the first half for an assessment of a head injury - added two conversions and two penalties before rounding things off with a late converted try of his own, as England joined France as the only two sides to have taken maximum points from the opening two weekends of the competition.

"Once we got into it we showed what England can do, and we are very proud of that performance," Joseph said afterwards. "We managed to eradicate the early errors and move forward.

"We have a great squad, a great bench, the boys who came on did well and we can look forward to the game in two weeks now."

"We thought we'd get our points in the last 20 minutes and that's how it turned out," Eddie Jones added.

"We got our rhythm and it was a pretty good performance. We tried to put pace in the game and get them fatigued."

The first half was the usual arm-wrestle that this fixture so often throws up with Ford's sharp try in the corner a rare highlight.

Although Canna landed three penalties, Italy's old failing of poor goalkicking hurt them again as he missed a straightforward shot soon after the restart that would have put them ahead -- and the hosts paid a heavy price.

Under no real pressure, Leonardo Sarto floated a calamitous pass 15 metres in front of his own posts that Joseph picked off for a gift of a try.

Within five minutes he got his second from even closer range, scooping up a grubber by replacement scrumhalf Danny Care.

With the win in the bag England coach Eddie Jones felt able to empty his bench and give debuts to Maro Itoje and Paul Hill, with flanker Jack Clifford winning a second cap.

More forward pressure then got the ball to Joseph but this time he had to use all his strength and determination to force his way through three tacklers and score his third.

Great passing then opened the way for Farrell to score a superb fifth as England, in the second half at least, delivered the "good hiding" Jones had demanded after opening their account with victory in Scotland last week.