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Full extent of Mako Vunipola injury revealed by Saracens
By Ian Cameron
Unwanted England prop Mako Vunipola is set for a significant period on the sidelines as the full extent of his injury has been revealed by Saracens.
Vunipola limped off with an ankle injury early in last weekend's game against Leicester Tigers and the out-of-favour England prop now faces months out of the game.
Saracens director of rugby Mark McCall has confirmed that the 31-year-old will go under the knife on Monday to treat an ankle syndesmosis injury that will likely sideline him for eight to ten weeks.
Despite starting the second Test for the British & Irish Lions last summer, Eddie Jones cut the veteran prop from his England squad.
As a result Vunipola hasn't played a minute of Test rugby since the tour. Mako and his No.8 brother Billy were the biggest victims of Jones’ new vision for England’s future, while Jamie George and Elliot Daly have been given reprieves on account of injury and form.
“A number of the senior players we felt were starting to tail off a little bit. We needed some more energy, some more drive,” said Jones when asked about the player cull that appears to have brought Vunipola Test career to a premature end. “I feel like we are in a really good position to use the next two years to establish a team that can challenge and win the World Cup in 2023.
“To me, it’s always about looking after now, but you’ve always got to have an eye to the future.
“And it’s a judgement call, there’s no science to tell you this is right, this is wrong. But we feel like we’re in a good position.
“We’ve got four campaigns until the World Cup. Every campaign is important. Every campaign, we want to make sure we are moving in the right direction."
England forwards coach Matt Proudfoot has said that the Saracens loosehead knows what he needs to do to get back into the squad.
"He is an incredible player and we think long and hard before we make selections,” explained Proudfoot. “Mako is right there. What Mako needs is to play, to play regularly, to put some performances back together which I think he has. So he is right in the pecking order. We think very long and hard about it and as we all know selection is Eddie’s prerogative."
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I guess the other option would be to start ALB, he's looked good in the 12 so far when he starts and sets up those outside him. But that would mean putting the vice captain on the bench, which is unlikely. Another option would be to drop Reiko to the bench and play Proctor, though he's gone home so that's not going to happen either.
Both of those players just offer more of the soft distribution skills good centres learn from playing their careers there. Unfortunately that's what's lacking with the current combo.
Go to commentsWhatever let's see if this load of waffle is still valid in 2 years time. ABs will rise we have a lot of new talent coming through. The NPC was the highest standard for years. The game is changing to suit the fast pace we like to play. We get to play the Springboks more, including the franchises, which will make us better! Overall I am optimistic. I will add having watched the England game multiple times we made most of the play. England are an awesome physical team, but you can expect the All Blacks to get better and better at executing the chances. It could easily have been 5 tries to one instead of 3 to 1.
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