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Borthwick reveals how Farrell reacted to getting benched by England
By Liam Heagney
Steve Borthwick has explained how Owen Farrell reacted this week to his demotion from the England starting team to face France this Saturday at Twickenham. The head coach had named the Saracens player as the Test team’s skipper when he originally named his Guinness Six Nations squad in January and Farrell went on to lead the side in the February matches against Scotland, Italy and Wales.
The latter two of those appearances came at No10 as he was switched into that position from inside centre in place of the benched Marcus Smith after the pair had initially combined as the starting England 10/12 for the opening round loss versus Scotland.
Borthwick has now had another selection rethink, though, ahead of the round four clash versus France and it was at 1:30pm on Thursday when the RFU confirmed that Smith would wear the No10 jersey this weekend - with Farrell dropping to the replacements and acting as the No22 bench backup.
Asked at his follow-up media briefing about how Farrell had taken the news of his England demotion, Borthwick explained: “Owen has been brilliant, he always is. He trains brilliantly, he leads this team fantastically well whatever role he is put in and he has been incredible this week.
“I can’t praise Owen enough, not just for this week but every day since we started working together in this capacity. Owen has been just an incredible trainer, an incredible help with all the players around the squad - he cares so deeply about this team. Owen is a player who has incredible respect from everyone attached to the England rugby team.”
Borthwick clarified that Farrell will retake the England captaincy as soon as he is introduced from the bench on Saturday. “Ellis Genge is captaining the team for the first time and I’m delighted for him as he is a fantastic leader. We are blessed with brilliant leaders in this squad.
“Unfortunately, Courtney Lawes had to leave the squad this week due to injury, another brilliant leader, so Ellis will captain the team at the start of the game and then Owen will captain the team when he comes onto the pitch."
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Latest Comments
You forget this is Rassie Erasmus who is still holding the Springbok keys. Even with Felix Jones orchestrating a really tight RWC SF last year. It still wasn't enough to get England past their particular Springbok Monkey in world cups. The reason is FJ was going off of what they did in 2019 not necessarily adapting to current Springboks. So yes, Australia can get passed England because let's be honest, England have a one track strategy, Springboks do not. Even with rush defense I wouldn't be surprised if Rassie continually tweaks it. Also bear in mind Rassie is happy to sacrifice a few mid year and inter World Cup matches to pin point how opposition plays and how to again tweak strategies to get his Springboks in peak performance for the next World Cup. As much as most teams like to win games in front of them and try to win everything, Rassie always makes sure to learn and train for the greatest showdown International Rugby has to offer. Tbh, most people remember World Cup wins and ignore intermediate losses as a result but will remember also WC losses, Ireland, even if they won games in the interim. So even if games are won against the Springboks, it's likely Rassie is just getting a feel for how opposition is moving and adapt accordingly…in time.
Go to commentsDanny don't care. He pretends to care but he don't. He says all this stuff to justify his reasoning but no one can claim that legitimately. He knew exactly what he was doing and wondered if his old team mate would overlook it, which he did. Ref has got to be sidelined or properly trained. It's one thing for refs to move up the ranks but if it was me I would require refs to either have played in different clubs or not at all having the temptation to bias in high stakes games like this. This has got to be stamped out. But then again World Rugby is so destroying the game of rugby in an attempt to be more “safe” and “concussion free”. What they are doing is making it more infuriating for the fans and more difficult for the refs to officiate evenly and consistently. It's fast become Australian Rules football. If guys don't want concussions, they should have played chess. Stop complaining you oldies of the game. When they played the game was vastly heavier hitting than it is now but of course they can't see that.
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