If you’re a fan of Sylvester Stallone’s Rocky franchise of films, chances are you’ll love a good training montage. England Rugby have released a video of their recent training camp, and it looks pretty hardcore.

For many players, they were pushed harder than they’ve ever trained before, with rugby drills interspersed with strange-looking strength exercises as they built up to the Rugby World Cup.

While Rocky hacked at and felled trees singlehandedly in his fourth film, it took three England players to flip a log end over end. But this was real life, not Hollywood, and England will have 15 Ivan Dragos looking to knock them down when the face Fiji in the tournament’s opening game.

“The best thing that’s come out of this for us is the togetherness and respect that’s come out of suffering together and making us tighter as a group,” says backs coach Andy Farrell.

I expect (hope) that Stuart Lancaster’s final selections for his 31-man squad came down to on-the-field performance, rather than who was the best lasso-er of a fake metal bull, but no doubt the training and bonding will pay off on the pitch.