Speaking to media in Queenstown yesterday afternoon, defence coach Mike Ford said even though the team missed more than 14 tackles against Argentina, he had taken heart that its "system" worked.
"I'm not sitting here thinking our defence is the be all and end all. We have a lot of work to do [but] when you put a system in place ... if you do miss a tackle, you have cover in some form or another.
"Our scramble defence was pretty good.
"At the end of the day, we kept them tryless, which is pretty good."
Ford said first five-eighth Jonny Wilkinson appeared to have an uncharacteristic "off day", missing five kicks at goal, but would "put my mortgage" on him landing every kick in training this week.
"It was a bit surreal to watch.
"It was just one of those things [but] he had the character to get that one that put us four points in front."
Ford said the match-defining kick would be classed as easy under normal circumstances, but for Wilkinson on Saturday night it was a tough kick "and he just stepped up and nailed it".
England forwards coach John Wells said about 10 of the side made their World Cup debuts in Dunedin on Saturday and the pressures on them could not be underestimated.
"You're going out and playing against one of the ... wiliest, nuggety teams you are going to come across.
"We managed to find a way to win a game for the first 60 minutes we found very difficult to get our hands on.
"The guys trusted what we were doing ... they stayed together, they didn't start to panic ... they found a way to make what they were doing in training ... work for them."