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England explain picking Joe Marchant and rushing back Joe Marler

(Photo by Richard Sellers/PA Images via Getty Images)

Eddie Jones has named his England matchday 23 to face the Springboks this Saturday and among the major talking points were the inclusions of the two Joes from Harlequins – Joe Marchant as a starter on the right wing and Joe Marler as the loosehead replacement despite his recent isolation following his positive test for Covid-19. The six-cap Marchant has only started once in his six previous appearances for England but Jones believed the 25-year-old was the ideal choice to be this weekend’s No14 starter.

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Adam Radwan wore that particular shirt in the Autumn Nations Series opener versus Tonga and the jersey was then passed on to Manu Tuilagi for last weekend’s clash with the Wallabies in what was a first start for the midfielder at No14 in seven years.

Now the baton has been passed on again after the injury to skipper Owen Farrell paved the way for Tuilagi to return to the inside centre role he had against the Tongans. However, rather than take another look at Radwan, Jones had instead opted to select Marchant as the starting right-winger.

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Springboks legend Bryan Habana guests on RugbyPass Offload

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Springboks legend Bryan Habana guests on RugbyPass Offload

In his six Test caps so far stretching back to August 2019, Marchant’s only start came in the midfield in a pre-World Cup warm-up versus Italy. His other five appearances at international level have been off the bench and just two of the caps came as a winger – against Georgia last November and versus Canada last July. 

Despite this inexperience, Jones was adamant that Marchant was the ideal candidate to start on the basis of how the Springboks will look to play against England. “We know that South Africa is going to come through the air.

“They have a fairly stated game plan and winning the air is an important part of their game. We feel like Joe Marchant is one of the best in England in the air so he brings that ability to contest in the air really well. He is a strong defender and a strong runner with the ball so he suits the way we want to play this week.”

Marchant’s Harlequins colleague Marler has been named on the England bench despite being in isolation since testing positive for Covid on November 8. His ten-day isolation period only ends on Thursday night, meaning that Friday’s captain’s run at Twickenham will be his only training session with his teammates in advance of Saturday’s game.     

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“He has had a diet of reps and he has got a gym at his home, so he has been working out,” explained Jones about the loosehead who will provide cover for the starting Bevan Rodd, the 21-year-old prop who is winning just his second cap. “We are anticipating he will be out of isolation at 8 o’clock this evening [Thursday] and he will be ready to go. 

We don’t have a bomb squad like South Africa is so proud about but we have Joe Marler and we have Will Stuart and with the young guy (Nic) Dolly from Leicester, we are looking forward to taking them on in that last 20 and 30 minutes of the game.”

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Flankly 57 minutes ago
'Absolute madness': Clive Woodward rips into Borthwick in wake of NZ loss

Borthwick is supposed to be the archetypical conservative coach, the guy that might not deliver a sparkling, high-risk attacking style, but whose teams execute the basics flawlessly. And that's OK, because it can be really hard to beat teams that are rock solid and consistent in the rugby equivalent of "blocking and tackling".


But this is why the performance against NZ is hard to defend. You can forgive a conservative, back-to-basics team for failing to score tons of tries, because teams like that make up for it with reliability in the simple things. They can defend well, apply territorial pressure, win the set piece battles, and take their scoring chances with metronomic goal kicking, maul tries and pick-and-go goal line attacks.


The reason why the English rugby administrators should be on high alert is not that the English team looked unable to score tries, but that they were repeatedly unable to close out a game by executing basic, coachable skills. Regardless of how they got to the point of being in control of their destiny, they did get to that point. All that was needed was to be world class at things that require more training than talent. But that training was apparently missing, and the finger has to point at the coach.


Borthwick has been in the job for nearly two years, a period that includes two 6N programs and an RWC campaign. So where are the solid foundations that he has been building?

4 Go to comments
N
Nickers 1 hour ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

Very poor understanding of what's going on and 0 ability to read. When I say playing behind the gain line you take this to mean all off-loads and site times we are playing in front of the gain line???


Every time we play a lot of rugby behind the gain line (for clarity, meaning trying to build an attack and use width without front foot ball 5m+ behind the most recent breakdown) we go backwards and turn the ball over in some way. Every time a player is tackled behind the most recent breakdown you need more and more people to clear out because your forwards have to go back around the corner, whereas opposition players can keep moving forward. Eventually you run out of either players to clear out or players to pass to and the result in a big net loss of territory and often a turnover. You may have witnessed that 20+ times in the game against England. This is a particularly dumb idea inside your own 40m which is where, for some reason, we are most likely to employ it.


The very best ABs teams never built an identity around attacking from poor positions. The DC era team was known for being the team that kicked the most. To engineer field position and apply pressure, and create broken play to counter attack. This current team is not differentiating between when a defence has lost it's structure and there are opportunities, and when they are completely set and there is nothing on. The reason they are going for 30 minute + periods in every game without scoring a single point, even against Japan and a poor Australian team, is because they are playing most of their rugby on the back foot in the wrong half.

43 Go to comments
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Nickers 1 hour ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

I thought we made a lot of progress against that type of defence by the WC last year. Lots of direct running and punching holes rather than using width. Against that type of defence I think you have to be looking to kick on first phase when you have front foot ball which we did relatively successfully. We are playing a lot of rugby behind the gain line at the moment. They are looking for those little interchanges for soft shoulders and fast ball or off loads but it regularly turns into them battering away with slow ball and going backwards, then putting in a very rushed kick under huge pressure.


JB brought that dimension when he first moved into 12 a couple of years ago but he's definitely not been at his best this year. I don't know if it is because he is being asked to play a narrow role, or carrying a niggle or two, but he does not look confident to me. He had that clean break on the weekend and stood there like he was a prop who found himself in open space and didn't know what to do with the ball. He is still a good first phase ball carrier though, they use him a lot off the line out to set up fast clean ball, but I don't think anyone is particularly clear on what they are supposed to do at that point. He was used really successfully as a second playmaker last year but I don't think he's been at that role once this year. He is a triple threat player but playing a very 1 dimensional role at the moment. He and Reiko have been absolutely rock solid on defence which is why I don't think there will be too much experimentation or changes there.

43 Go to comments
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