Jamie George (knee) and Owen Farrell (ankle) out of SA gameWill provide an interesting selection.I’ll guess Manu back to 12 and Blamire starting at 2
I’d love to see a starting back row of Underhill, Curry and Simmonds with Lawes back to second row with Itoje.That said, does Lawes play back row for Northampton these days?
Apart from Launchbury.
And Raffi Quirke did nothing to disprove my opinion that he'll be England's starting scrum half in the 2023 World Cup
Quote from: nordenvillain on November 21, 2021, 10:21:48 PMAnd Raffi Quirke did nothing to disprove my opinion that he'll be England's starting scrum half in the 2023 World CupThere's a lot of good young 9s around, which is why the persistent inclusion of Ben fucking Youngs pisses me off so much. I'd honestly struggle to fit him into my top 5 right now.Quirke and Mitchell would be my 2 in the 23 (and I'd change who started depending on the game plan), if the idea is to get the ball wide and make ground int he backs then I'd go with Mitchell who is fantastic at raising the tempo of games but if it's more of an arm-wrestle Quirke comes in for the extra defensive quality and his ability to put people through 'around the corner.' Why I like them both though is that they run fantastic support lines and have both scored tries in this series on the back of it. They're also easily the quickest 9s we have available and could both hold their own against most wingers.The other big break-through was that we eventually got to see a proper run out for Marchant, who looked superb. Hopefully it was enough to make Jones realise he's easily the best centre in the country.
Quote from: paul_e on November 22, 2021, 09:27:55 AMQuote from: nordenvillain on November 21, 2021, 10:21:48 PMAnd Raffi Quirke did nothing to disprove my opinion that he'll be England's starting scrum half in the 2023 World CupThere's a lot of good young 9s around, which is why the persistent inclusion of Ben fucking Youngs pisses me off so much. I'd honestly struggle to fit him into my top 5 right now.Quirke and Mitchell would be my 2 in the 23 (and I'd change who started depending on the game plan), if the idea is to get the ball wide and make ground int he backs then I'd go with Mitchell who is fantastic at raising the tempo of games but if it's more of an arm-wrestle Quirke comes in for the extra defensive quality and his ability to put people through 'around the corner.' Why I like them both though is that they run fantastic support lines and have both scored tries in this series on the back of it. They're also easily the quickest 9s we have available and could both hold their own against most wingers.The other big break-through was that we eventually got to see a proper run out for Marchant, who looked superb. Hopefully it was enough to make Jones realise he's easily the best centre in the country.I think the Ben Youngs selection is about not wanting to play a rookie 9 and 10, which makes perfect sense (well to me it does 😁)Now Smith has proved he can step up I think you’ll find the other 9’s will get more starts