Clive Woodward has admitted that his results as England coach have been unacceptable - but he will still sign a new contract before the summer tour of South Africa.
Woodward will meet Rugby Football Union chief executive Francis Baron and Club England chairman Fran Cotton to thrash out a new deal which is expected to take him through until the 2003 World Cup.
Then he must "hit the accelerator'' to find a replacement for forwards coach John Mitchell, who returned to New Zealand following Sunday's Six Nations defeat by Scotland at Murrayfield.
Having confirmed his own desire to carry on his work at the head of the English coaching team, Woodward believes Mitchell's replacement should be the first in line to follow him into the main job.
Bath coach Andy Robinson is a clear favourite, with Leicester's John Wells and Dean Ryan of Bristol the outside candidates.
Woodward has his own one-man shortlist but he does not know if his choice wants the job. "In an ideal world, John's replacement will be my successor,'' said the England coach. "I wish I had benefited from having two, three or four years in the set-up before stepping into the breach.
"In my mind, the choice is down to one man, but if he says no we will have to look at it again. There is no guarantee he will be on board before the summer tour. It is very important that I get the right person and it has to be a full-time appointment. And I will not discount anyone just because they are under contract. It has
to be viewed as a promotion.''
Woodward is to spend the next couple of weeks assessing the form of some of his recently-injured stars such as Kyran Bracken and Dan Luger before finalising his 36-man party for the summer tour.
Having rejected the idea of taking two separate squads for the five-match, two-Test trip, the England coach has, however, confirmed that Liam Botham, Trevor Woodman and David Flatman will all be included, as will Bath lock Steve Borthwick, rated still short of international class but a definite future England cap.
British Lions skipper Martin Johnson will also be there, although whether he takes over the captaincy from Matt Dawson is open to debate. "I want to give it a bit of thought,'' said Woodward, who denied Johnson's exclusion had contributed to England's demise in Edinburgh. "I spoke to Martin at length and he still isn't fully fit. If we had brought him back and lost it would have been terrible. After speaking to him I was more certain of the situation and I do not regret the decision.''
Woodward has come under fire following Sunday's dismal display, when he accepted that England were comprehensively outplayed by opponents who had not won a single match in this year's competition until that stage. Losing important matches is becoming an increasingly irritating habit for England, defeated by Wales as they went for the Grand Slam at Wembley last season, then by New Zealand and South Africa in the recent World Cup.
"The overall record is not acceptable,'' said Woodward, "because you get judged on results. Every year I have gone into the Championship saying we want to win the Grand Slam and for the last two seasons we have gone to the last game. But I also look beyond that in terms of the way we are trying to play because we had to change a lot of things in order to be successful.