Jack van Poortvliet set to play first match since his England injury
Jack van Poortvliet is poised to make his comeback seven months after an ankle injury ruled him out of the Rugby World Cup with England.
The 22-year-had had been named on August 7 in Steve Borthwick’s squad for the finals, but his trip to France 2023 was scuppered five days later by a first-half setback versus Wales in the Summer Nations Series.
His unavailability resulted in Alex Mitchell being called up and the Northampton scrum-half has since made the No9 Test shirt his own as he has started in 10 of England's last 13 matches.
Thirty-two weeks after his injury, van Poortvliet has now been named on the Leicester bench for Friday night’s Gallagher Premiership game at home to Gloucester, who beat the Tigers 13-23 in last weekend’s Premiership Rugby Cup final at Kingsholm.
The inclusion of van Poortvliet isn’t the only selection to catch the eye as Freddie Steward, who was dropped by England following their Guinness Six Nations round two win over Wales on February 10, is set to play his first match since that omission.
Ollie Chessum and Dan Cole, starters for England in their final match of the championship last Saturday away to France, have also been named to start as has openside Tommy Reffell, who was involved with Wales in their defeat versus Italy.
Leicester head coach Dan McKellar told the club website: “It’s great to have the whole group back together. The international boys have worked hard to reintegrate themselves and they are ready to go and we are focused on delivering a performance in front of our home crowd.
“It’s fair to say we’re all really pleased for Jack to see him back fit, healthy and wearing a Tigers jersey.”
Leicester (vs Gloucester, Friday)
15. Freddie Steward [81]
14. Josh Bassett [13]
13. Dan Kelly [76]
12. Solomone Kata [13]
11. Ollie Hassell-Collins [15]
10. Handre Pollard [27]
9. Ben Youngs [312]
1. James Cronin [28]
2. Julian Montoya [53]
3. Dan Cole [317]
4. Harry Wells [192
5. Ollie Chessum [53]
6. Hanro Liebenberg [101]
7. Tommy Reffell [109]
8. Jasper Wiese [72]
Replacements:
16. Finn Theobald-Thomas [9]
17. James Whitcombe [48]
18. Joe Heyes [138]
19. Kyle Hatherell [16]
20. Olly Cracknell [36]
21. Jack van Poortvliet [66]
22. Jamie Shillcock [21]
23. Phil Cokanasiga [13]
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What’s new its a common occurrence, just the journos out there expecting a negative spin. The outcome will be beneficial to jordie and Leinster. The home grown lads hav got some experience to step up to and be more competitive, that or spend the 6 months keeping the bench warm.
Go to commentsI’m all for speeding up the game. But can we be certain that the slowness of the game contributed to fans walking out? I’m not so sure. Super rugby largely suffered from most fans only being able to, really, follow the games played in their own time zone. So at least a third of the fan base wasn’t engaged at any point in time. As a Saffer following SA teams in the URC - I now watch virtually every European game played on the weekend. In SR, I wouldn’t be bothered to follow the games being played on the other side of the world, at weird hours, if my team wasn’t playing. I now follow the whole tournament and not just the games in my time zone. Second, with New Zealand teams always winning. It’s like formula one. When one team dominates, people lose interest. After COVID, with SA leaving and Australia dipping in form, SR became an even greater one horse race. Thats why I think Japan’s league needs to get in the mix. The international flavor of those teams could make for a great spectacle. But surely if we believe that shaving seconds off lost time events in rugby is going to draw fans back, we should be shown some figures that supports this idea before we draw any major conclusions. Where are the stats that shows these changes have made that sort of impact? We’ve measured down to the average no. Of seconds per game. Where the measurement of the impact on the fanbase? Does a rugby “fan” who lost interest because of ball in play time suddenly have a revived interest because we’ve saved or brought back into play a matter of seconds or a few minutes each game? I doubt it. I don’t thinks it’s even a noticeable difference to be impactful. The 20 min red card idea. Agreed. Let’s give it a go. But I think it’s fairer that the player sent off is substituted and plays no further part in the game as a consequence.
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