England, New Zealand, Canada - which favourite impressed the most?

There were many things that went right for England, with the scrum a particular highlight

- Sarah Rendell

The three main contenders to win the trophy at Twickenham next month came through their opening group matches at the Rugby World Cup with dominant scorelines but far from perfect performances. England, the hosts, thrashed USA 69-7, Canada overcame Fiji 65-7 and New Zealand beat a resolute and determined Spain 54-8. Have any of them emerged as clear favourites? Let's take a look at each performance.

The Red Roses admitted they had room for improvement with two particular areas letting them down: restarts and handling errors. When the England head coach, John Mitchell, was asked about the restarts he said: "There is always something to work on, this game is never finite. We will move that into the next preparation. It's good that we've got something to work on."

There were many things that went right for England, with the scrum a particular highlight. The props Maud Muir and Hannah Botterman had standout games and the player of the match, Ellie Kildunne, was superb again, a touch off her knee in the buildup to one of England's 11 tries displayed her growing skillset. So while it was a little bit of a rusty start, the Red Roses have the makings of a team who can grow through this tournament.