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Johnson's mood seemed to capture the spirit of the day. Where previously there had been doubts and worries about his side, suddenly there was optimism and hope.

In glorious sunshine, England played vibrant attacking rugby to take their first major scalp of Johnson's reign. Mark Cueto's first-minute try sent the crowd into raptures, and they noisily backed their team for the rest of the match.

Johnson said Sunday's performance had been the culmination of all he and his coaching staff had been working towards since he took his job last summer. The only difference had been confidence and execution, he insisted.

He was particularly pleased for his attack coach Brian Smith, because at long last we had seen the adventurous play anticipated when the Australian was appointed last summer.

"A lot of stuff Brian has been working hard on really came off today," Johnson said. "We always knew it would work if we executed well."

Throughout the team, problem positions were suddenly filled with star performers.

Toby Flood gave his best display to date in an England shirt, showing vision and quick hands, highlighted by a lovely inside pass to Cueto in the run-up to Riki Flutey's try.

Joe Worsley, superb in defence but non-existent in attack against Wales and Ireland, was suddenly a regular feature in the line and even scored a try, while Delon Armitage rediscovered his exuberant form of the autumn and Ugo Monye proved his pace with one searing dart past his opposite number, Julien Malzieu.

Discipline - or lack of it - had dominated the run-up to the match, with England having conceded more penalties and three times as many yellow cards as any other team in the tournament.

But despite two players being threatened with visits to the sin bin, the home side managed to keep all 15 men on the pitch throughout against France.

They still conceded 13 penalties - more than the target of 10 set by Johnson - but the tally was almost paltry by their previous standards.

Amidst all this optimism, we have to ask just how bad France were though.

Their coach, Mark Lievremont, suggested French errors had been as much a reason for the result as English endeavour.

"We have really been too fragile in too many areas of the game to be able to challenge England," he said.

for the 2011 World Cup.

Yet this defeat left me wondering whether the France coach could actually be causing more damage than good to some of his young players.

The introduction of the experienced Damien Traille after the interval certainly improved the French greatly, contributing skill and know-how that the bullocking 20-year-old Mathieu Bastareaud had not even hinted at.

France went on to win the second half 10-5 as England only rarely reproduced the attacking excellence of the first 40 minutes.

So is there a risk England fans will get too carried away with this one result?

Johnson vowed that "there's more to come" while Armitage was positively bullish as he looked ahead to England's final Six Nations match against Scotland at Twickenham.

"We will improve even more, because we've got a young squad," he said. "If we lift the tempo and are more clinical, teams can't live with us."