Nine uncapped players make England U20 XV to face Bath
Mark Mapletoft and Andy Titterrell have named nine uncapped players in the England U20 starting XV to take on Bath United tomorrow in Bristol, as they prepare for the U20 Six Nations next month.
Last season's U18 captain Henry Pollock is set to start at openside flanker alongside captain Nathan Michelow in the back-row. The 18-year-old Pollock is registered with Northampton Saints and Bedford Blues in the Championship, and was named the Saints player of the month in September.
They will face a Bath side at Shaftesbury Park, home of Dings Crusaders, largely comprising academy players and coached by former England senior head coach Andy Robinson. With that said, two-cap England winger and member of Eddie Jones' 2019 World Cup squad Ruaridh McConnochie is starting on the wing for Bath.
After naming his side, Mapletoft said: “It’s been a real pleasure to bring this new cohort together over the last week, the boys have showcased a real intent on proving themselves in a game capacity for the first time.
“Our training regime has reflected the intensity we want to arrive with in Saturday’s game with Bath. We know Bath’s capabilities in producing some of the country’s best talent, so this weekend’s meeting is a suitable one for our boys.
“Myself, Andy and the rest of the coaching staff expect a really competitive 80 minutes at Shaftesbury Park. The boys are aware that the U20 Six Nations awaits in a few weeks, but our focus remains on attaining a positive performance on Saturday afternoon.”
England U20
1 Cameron Miell (Leicester Tigers)
2 Craig Wright (Northampton Saints) *
3 Billy Sela (Bath Rugby)
4 Olamide Sodeke (Saracens)
5 Joe Bailey (Exeter Chiefs) *
6 Nathan Michelow (C) (Saracens) *
7 Henry Pollock (Northampton Saints)
8 Lucas Schmid (Harlequins)
9 Ben Douglas (Newcastle Falcons)
10 Rory Taylor (Gloucester Rugby)
11 Sean Kerr (Harlequins)
12 Ben Waghorn (Harlequins) *
13 Toby Cousins (Northampton Saints) *
14 Alex Wills (Sale Sharks) *
15 Ben Redshaw (Newcastle Falcons)
Replacements
16 Scott Kirk (Bath Rugby)
17 Jacob Oliver (Newcastle Falcons)
18 James Halliwell (Bristol Bears) *
19 Junior Kpoku (Racing 92)
20 Finn Carnduff (Leicester Tigers) *
21 Zach Carr (Harlequins) *
22 Max Blinkhorn (Nottingham University)
23 Josh Bellamy (Harlequins)
24 Ollie Spencer (Newcastle Falcons)
25 Will Glister (Northampton Saints)
26 Ioan Jones (Gloucester Rugby)
*denotes a player previously capped at U20 level
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After a fairly simple Pac4, the BFs will find out a lot about themselves in September when they face the rampaging RedRoses at Twickenham in front of a record crowd. After that they will face them again in Canada in WXV1. They also have France to contend with. Will be interesting to see what Australia have to offer with Jo Yapp at the helm.
Go to commentsSuper Rugby Pacific has been better as a spectacle due to the emphasis on speeding the game up and I’d look at taking things a step further. Instead of giving teams 90 seconds to take a conversion, let’s bring that down 60 seconds. You could also look at allowing 45 seconds for a penalty goal. Maybe teams could get 20 seconds instead of 30 to form a scrum before the ref then starts the engagement process. However, this year the most pleasing change is the added competitiveness in the Trans Tasman matches. What does frustrate me is how the rugby media in Australasia allow the the whole ‘‘rugby is boring’’/’’rugby yawnion’’ narrative to take hold from from vindictive league types, the chairman of the ARL commission and News Limited Australia. Stick up for the game and shift the narrative!
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