England squad can give the Six Nations a good go
I’m not saying I didn’t expect it from a coach like Steve Borthwick but it’s great to see an England Six Nations squad picked on form at the moment.
There are a few choices and calls I disagree with but off the back of what I read on Monday, I think England can give the Six Nations a real good go.
That said, Billy Vunipola simply should have been in that 36-man squad. Close calls were made when finalising this training group ahead of next month’s Championship, sure, but it’s a travesty that the Saracens No8 is not there.
He has been pivotal to Saracens this year and an example of a player who lost form – a couple of seasons back – but worked his way back to being in contention.
Borthwick is clearly going for mobility – and that’s why the likes of Jonny May and Jack Nowell have been replaced with Ollie Hassell-Collins and Cadan Murley – which is fine, but the non-selection of Vunipola baffles me.
However, let’s talk about the positives. Ben Earl and Elliot Daly’s recalls are well earned – the pair have been exceptional in the Premiership and Europe this season and their inclusion points to what could be an exciting brand of rugby coming to the national team.
I think Northampton lock David Ribbans and Gloucester prop Val Rapava-Ruskin are unluckily not to get a look in this time around but that’s part and parcel of being on the path to getting – or keeping – international status, it’s always a fight to be in the mix.
Given the World Rugby rules on eligibility, I can see Rapava-Ruskin getting a couple of calls from the Georgian set up now.
Borthwick has gone with what he knows, nine Tigers – including 35-year-old Dan Cole – have made it into his inaugural squad.
Two of those are Ben Youngs and Jack van Poortvliet, which leaves Leicester without their three top scrum-halves if you include new head coach Richard Wigglesworth.
Landscape changing
What the current rugby landscape has shown us is that this idea of needing four years to be successful doesn’t always have to be the case.
Rassie Erasmus was with South Africa for less than the usual four-year cycle ahead of a World Cup and won it, Wayne Smith led the Black Ferns to World cup success with less than a year at the helm, and Nick Evans was part of a Harlequins team that won the Premiership just months after their head coach left.
In Eddie Jones, Warren Gatland and Steve Borthwick, three huge rugby nations – Australia, Wales and England – have hit the reset button. That only adds to the excitement of this World Cup.
I do feel for the now sacked Dave Rennie, his Australia side were good but they just weren’t getting the results – you have to wonder whether he’d still be in post if the Wallabies had beaten France in the autumn.
But Jones increases Australia’s World Cup hopes exponentially – he is an 18-month coach. Has he ever finished an opening two-year period with an awful record? I don’t recall that ever being the case.
As many of you will now have read, there is a chance that England and Australia may meet in the quarter-finals of the World Cup.
If that match was Eddie Jones or Steve Borthwick as England coach versus Dave Rennie, I’d back the England side. But with Jones at the helm Down Under, I couldn’t predict that match at all.
We’ve got all of the squads except Ireland’s – which is named today – and already I cannot wait for this year’s Six Nations.
China Sevens head coach Ollie Phillips is the founder of Optimist Performance, experts in leadership development and behavioural change. Follow Ollie on Twitter and on LinkedIn.