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'It's not ideal': Chris Ashton criticises Premiership's decision not to play on
By PA
Former England wing Chris Ashton has criticised the decision to take a break instead of filling the void left by the postponement of two rounds of European action with Premiership games. The Champions and Challenge Cups have been placed on hold after the French government barred their clubs from taking part in cross-border competitions because of coronavirus concerns.
Rob Baxter, Pat Lam and Lee Blackett – the directors of rugby of title challengers Exeter, Bristol and Wasps respectively – called for Premiership fixtures to be brought forward to enable English teams to continue playing.
Premiership Rugby, however, has chosen to implement a break on welfare grounds and Ashton, the Harlequins finisher who won 44 caps for England, believes it is the wrong call.
“It’s not ideal for us as players,” Ashton told the BBC’s Rugby Union Weekly podcast. “We were due to play anyway so I don’t think it matters what competition it is - if it was European or carrying on in the Premiership.
“The last thing teams want is to go two weekends without a game. We need game time and need to keep playing, it just makes the competition healthy and keeps everyone fit and firing. It’s not ideal for us as players, but as always we will train for the next two weeks and try to put that in when we get back to playing.”
There has no update yet on when the two postponed European pool rounds of fixtures might take place. French government officials wanted it clubs to not play on the weekends of January 16 and 23 due to concerns surrounding the pandemic which stemmed from the December two rounds of fixtures.
The decision to postpone European fixtures scheduled for the weekends of 16 and 23 January came after the French government decreed its clubs should not play in the competitions this month. England's decision not to alter the Premiership's fixture list has now left a two-week gap in a schedule that will be packed when the from January 29 through to the end of the season.
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i think Argentina v France could be a good game too, depending on which Argentina turns up. The most difficult to call is Scotland Australia.
Go to commentsSmith is playing a different game with the rest of the backs struggling to understand. That's the problem with so called playmakers, if nobody gets what they're doing then it often just leads to a turnover. It gets worse when Borthwick changes one of them, which is why they don't score points at the end. Sometimes having a brilliant playmaker can be problematic if a team cannot be built around them. Once again Borthwick seems lacking in either coaching or selection. I can't help but think it's the latter coupled with pressure to select the big name players.
Lastly, his forward replacements are poor and exposed either lack of depth or selection pressure. Cole hemorrhages scrum penalties whenever he comes on, opponents take advantage of the England scrum and close out the game. Is that the best England can offer?
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