Category: England Rugby

England wing on handling Test pressure, the ‘awesome’ setup at Pennyhill Park and Northampton’s big ambitions

Tommy Freeman is known for being multi-talented, so it is fitting that he arrives brandishing a golf club. Thankfully none of the ensuing questions provoke its use in a non-sporting capacity. The Northampton back’s handicap will have to wait, because after a trip to Sale on Saturday he will dive into England’s Six Nations camp, surfacing in mid-March after the concluding fixture in Paris.

Les Bleus are the tournament favourites but if Steve Borthwick’s team stay on an upward curve – they have won 11 straight Tests – there is a decent chance that encounter at Stade de France in seven weeks’ time will decide the title. An expansive Saints side also top the Prem before round 10, and the ever-improving Freeman personifies the prevailing effervescence of club and country.

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France selection for Six Nations caused a huge stir but England’s head coach has no need to spring any shocks

Steve Borthwick names his England squad for the Six Nations on Friday and as much as we do not know about the precise makeup of the chosen party, there is plenty that we do. As much fun as it may be to imagine Borthwick rocking up at Twickenham in a sharp navy suit, ice-white trainers and a few selection bombshells in his pocket, the England head coach is not about to borrow from Fabien Galthié’s playbook.

Galthié’s decision to omit Damian Penaud, Grégory Alldritt and Gaël Fickou has created such a stir because it is radical by any measure but the point here is that Borthwick’s squad, in comparison to England’s closest rivals for the Six Nations title, is significantly more settled. He has a couple of injury concerns, as is always the case at this time of year, and he is expected to reward the recent form of the uncapped Greg Fisilau with a call-up, but what is likely to be most telling is how few surprises it contains.

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The Six Nations is a key staging post on the road to next year’s World Cup and with injuries biting, Wales offer the only real chance to experiment

On the face of it the Champions Cup has been helpful for the majority of Six Nations head coaches before this year’s championship. Gregor Townsend, for example, would dearly love Scotland to play with the purpose and passion currently oozing from Glasgow and will doubtless wish to ensure his national side exhibit similar characteristics.

Ditto France. If Fabien Galthié overlooks the electric form of Matthieu Jalibert, particularly with Romain Ntamack out injured for the next few weeks, his trademark thick-rimmed glasses must have misted up. There can be no rational reason not to bury la hachette with the Bordeaux fly-half and invite him to combine as brilliantly with Louis Bielle-Biarrey and Damian Penaud as the trio do at club level.

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Strip away the peroxide hair, the TikTok dancing and the trademark try celebrations and the Northampton and England flanker has a white-hot ambition to be the best

Next Wednesday will be Henry Pollock’s 21st birthday. You slightly feel for his family and friends: what do you buy a guy with the Midas touch? Two tries on debut for England in Cardiff, a British & Irish Lions tour of Australia and a world breakthrough player of the year nomination would be prized accolades for anyone, let alone a bleach-blond tyro with nine Prem starts.

A bottle of HP Sauce as an ironic gift, maybe? Sitting across the table in a snow-dusted Northampton is a young athlete who enjoys a bit of banter. But strip away the peripheral stuff – the hairstyle, the black headband, the TikTok dancing and the trademark try celebration – and most striking is his white-hot ambition. “I’m just a normal kid who has this amazing drive to want to be the best,” he says. “I’m never satisfied in anything I do.”

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• England ‘welcome whatever comes’ says bullish captain

• Wales’ Tandy ‘unbelievably excited’ by England clash

Maro Itoje has set his sights on Rugby World Cup glory in Australia in 2027 after England were handed a favourable potential path through the tournament when the draw was made in Sydney on Wednesday.

Steve Borthwick’s side, who have risen to third in the world rankings after an 11-match winning streak, emerged on the other side of the draw from the reigning world champions South Africa, three-times winners New Zealand and France.

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Signs are encouraging for an improving squad to invoke the glory of 2003 with rivals facing trickier routes in Australia

As the Ashes have reminded us, it never pays to get too excited in advance about winning in Australia. But once the draw for the 2027 men’s Rugby World Cup had concluded and the various knockout permutations had been crunched there was a strong whiff of deja vu in the Sydney air. A World Cup in Australia and a decent draw for England? What could possibly go wrong?

The organisers had already stoked the narrative nicely by wheeling out Jonny Wilkinson in the promotional tournament video, essentially a mashup of Mad Max and Wacky Races roaring across a dusty outback. When every Australian wakes up on Thursday to discover it is 666 days until the 2027 edition kicks off, the nagging fear of nightmarish history repeating itself will further intensify.

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• Tuilagi free to switch allegiances for 2027 World Cup

• Marchant available for England after signing for Sale

Manu Tuilagi has refused to rule out playing for Samoa at the 2027 Rugby World Cup, leaving open the possibility of him facing Steve Borthwick’s England in Australia.

The 34-year-old, who spearheaded the Red Rose midfield for more than a decade, would qualify for the Pacific Island nation in 2027 under eligibility rules introduced four years ago.

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• Head coach’s current deal runs until 2027

• RFU annual report shows net loss of £1.9m

The Rugby Football Union has no plans to begin talks with Steve ­Borthwick over extending his ­contract beyond 2027 “for the ­foreseeable future” despite England’s 11-match winning streak and autumn clean sweep.

Borthwick’s contract runs until the end of 2027 but with England halfway through the current World Cup cycle and currently third in the world ­rankings, the RFU chief ­executive, Bill Sweeney, has no immediate intention of discussing an extension in a sea change from the union’s ­previous approach.

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After 11 successive victories, England will go into next year’s Six Nations as the team to beat

A Six Nations grand slam, plus Nations Championship victories against South Africa and Fiji and England would head to Argentina next July having equalled their record run of 18 wins, in pursuit of a ground-breaking No 19. Sounds simple put like that, but there’s more chance of Steve Borthwick busting his best moves in England’s next viral TikTok video than him entertaining any thought of record runs.

That is not to criticise, because even though Borthwick is allergic to looking too far ahead, doing so would be to get drastically carried away. The point here is that the more England keep winning, and they will enter the Six Nations next year as the team to beat after 11 on the trot, the more expectation increases.

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Max Ojomoh scored one try and and set up two more as England held off a late comeback from Argentina.

This is Argentina’s third and final game of the autumn.

They spanked Wales by a record score and, as we’ve said multiple times, did the business as they came from behind to stun Scotland.

Wales 26-52 New Zealand

Ireland 13-24 South Africa

France 48-33 Australia

Italy 34-19 Chile

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Defeat of Argentina in 2000 was important stepping stone for Clive Woodward’s side on way to winning ultimate prize

It is exactly 25 years since the most fraught pre-match buildup in the history of English international rugby union. In this same week in November 2000 a pay row led to the entire national side walking out on strike, prompting Clive Woodward to threaten that an alternative team of lower-league amateurs would be chosen if his players did not return to training by 11am the following morning.

After a tense standoff they duly did so, a grudging truce was agreed and the weekend game against Argentina went ahead with England winning 19-0. Three years later all but two of that matchday squad (the exceptions were David Flatman and Matt Perry) were lifting the Rugby World Cup in Australia. The moral of the “strike” story? The darkest hour can be the springboard to a spectacular golden dawn.

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• Bath centre replaces Fraser Dingwall

• Itoje: ‘He has a bit of a swagger the way he plays’

Max Ojomoh has been backed to bring his swagger to England’s pursuit of an autumn internationals clean sweep after he was a late call-up following more disruption to Steve Borthwick’s side. Ojomoh has been thrust into the No 12 jersey for a first Twickenham start in place of the injured Fraser Dingwall but Maro Itoje believes the Bath centre will flourish against Argentina.

Dingwall’s withdrawal with a side strain sustained last weekend is further upheaval for Borthwick, who has already lost Ollie Lawrence, Jamie George and Tom Roebuck since the 33-19 triumph over the All Blacks. With Tommy Freeman and Ollie Chessum also injury casualties of the autumn, Borthwick’s ranks have been depleted but Ojomoh has been in fine fettle for Bath this season and impressed on his debut against the USA last summer.

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The Springboks are the standard-bearers in world rugby and will look to underline that position with a first win in Dublin in the Rassie Erasmus era

Be careful what you wish for. That would be my message to England supporters getting a little bit ahead of themselves and wishing that South Africa were due at Twickenham on Sunday. By all means get a little carried away – that’s the beauty of following a team on a winning run and it’s a demonstration of the confidence surrounding this England team at the moment – but the Springboks can wait until next summer.

South Africa remain the standard-bearers in world rugby. They are perfectly placed to achieve their goal of finishing the year as the No 1 team in the world and, given South Africa have never won in Dublin under Rassie Erasmus, there will be plenty of motivation to create another slice of history against Ireland on Saturday. The question is, have England closed the gap this autumn? And if so, by how much.

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Beating the All Blacks shows how far Steve Borthwick’s men have come – but there remains yet more room for improvement

After finally scaling Mount Everest with Tenzing Norgay on 29 May 1953 the first person Edmund Hillary encountered on his descent was his longtime climbing friend, George Lowe. “Well, George,” Hillary said, “we knocked the bastard off.” Which is basically how England’s captain, Maro Itoje, and his team felt on Saturday having lifted the Hillary Shield, named in honour of the indomitable New Zealander who conquered the world’s most famous summit.

English rugby’s ultimate Everest is still up ahead of them, of course, in the form of the 2027 World Cup, but this was their South Col moment. And while a first home win against the All Blacks since 2012 and their second‑highest margin of victory in this 120-year-old fixture will both be sources of satisfaction there was also a powerful sense that their upwardly mobile trek is far from complete.

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George Ford inspired England to their first win over the All Blacks in six years

Beauden Barrett sends the ball into England territory and we’re underway.

We’ve had the anthems and now it’s Haka time. England let slip that they have a very special response planned…

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