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How 'fit as I've seen him' Vunipola has put Lions snub to good use
By Liam Heagney
Mark McCall has issued a warning to Saracens' Gallagher Premiership rivals, claiming that Lions reject Billy Vunipola is in the best shape he has been in for years and is ready to hit the ground running when the new season opens at Bristol on Friday night. The England No8 has so far endured a 2021 to forget, his unimpressive run of games in the Six Nations followed by Warren Gatland's Lions selection snub.
Amid it all, there was much criticism about how Vunipola looked out on the pitch. For instance, in the wake of England's opening-round loss at home to Scotland last February, ex-Scotland coach Matt Williams unceremoniously put the boot in while doing some punditry on Irish TV.
“The Saracens players weren’t at the races,” claimed the Australian on Virgin Media. “Vunipola, if we didn’t know the pubs were closed you’d swear he had been in one. He was out of shape. There was no way he was ready for international rugby. Owen Farrell, one of the best players in the world, was way off the mark. Even the great (Maro) Itoje gave away a lot of penalties."
With Saracens playing the Championship, Vunipola's struggles with England left him vulnerable to being overlooked for Gatland's Lions trip to South Africa and that was how it turned out, England outcast Sam Simmonds getting chosen to tour instead even though he hadn't played for Eddie Jones at Test level since Match 2018.
Vunipola has since licked his wounds and, according to Saracens boss McCall, he now is primed to remind people about how good a rugby player he actually is. "Good, really good," said McCall when asked by RugbyPass how Vunipola was shaping up ahead of the start to the 2021/22 season.
"He has got the bit between his teeth. He is as fit as I have seen him in a long time. His leadership during the course of the pre-season with many other senior players not being here has been wonderful so we are looking forward to seeing him get stuck in," he added, without revealing how many pounds Vunipola has shed in pre-season in preparation for the new season kick-off.
"Usually Billy putting weight on doesn't mean as fit as he has ever been so he is exactly the way we want him to be. He has trained really hard, he hasn't had any hiccups in pre-season so he will be hitting the ground running on Friday night."
Missing out on the Lions was essentially a double whammy for Vunipola as he pulled out injured in 2017 after getting originally selected for that year's trip to New Zealand. The No8 has now had 19 weeks to come to terms with his exclusion from the squad chosen by Gatland in early May, but McCall is uncertain his player is fully over the snub.
"I'm not sure that he definitely is (over it)," continued the Saracens boss ahead of Friday's trip to Ashton Gate. "I haven't talked to him a lot about it in the last couple of months. I know he was hugely disappointed not to go and sometimes those things take time to get over."
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Latest Comments
Nah, that just needs some more variation. Chip kicks, grubber stabs, all those. Will Jordan showed a pretty good reason why the rush was bad for his link up with BB.
If you have an overlap on a rush defense, they naturally cover out and out and leave a huge gap near the ruck.
It also helps if both teams play the same rules. ARs set the offside line 1m past where the last mans feet were😅
Go to commentsYeah nar, should work for sure. I was just asking why would you do it that way?
It could be achieved by outsourcing all your IP and players to New Zealand, Japan, and America, with a big Super competition between those countries raking it in with all of Australia's best talent to help them at a club level. When there is enough of a following and players coming through internally, and from other international countries (starting out like Australia/without a pro scene), for these high profile clubs to compete without a heavy australian base, then RA could use all the money they'd saved over the decades to turn things around at home and fund 4 super sides of their own that would be good enough to compete.
That sounds like a great model to reset the game in Aus. Take a couple of decades to invest in youth and community networks before trying to become professional again. I just suggest most aussies would be a bit more optimistic they can make it work without the two decades without any pro club rugby bit.
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