Steve Borthwick is expected to call on the cavalry for England’s clash with Wales on Saturday with the captain Owen Farrell among those ready to deliver a boost to his side’s faltering warm-up campaign.
Borthwick last week decided to omit all players who appeared in the Premiership final out of the starting lineup for the defeat in Cardiff, with the exception of Max Malins. After that lacklustre performance, however, Borthwick is expected to unleash something much closer to his first-choice XV in the rematch at Twickenham with Premiership finalists Farrell, Billy Vunipola, Maro Itoje, Jamie George, Elliot Daly, Ben Earl, George Ford and possibly Manu Tuilagi all in the reckoning.
“I did not select many of the players from that final because I wanted them to have another week of training,” said Borthwick, after the 20-9 defeat by Wales. “In terms of their availability, with another week of conditioning they become more ready for selection.”
How Borthwick chooses to deploy Farrell will be fascinating. Tuilagi may need to sit out after a recent groin niggle but with Ollie Lawrence fit again, Borthwick could deploy the Bath centre alongside either Joe Marchant or Daly in midfield, allowing Farrell to play at fly-half. Another option is to start Ford at fly-half with Farrell at inside centre and Lawrence moving out to the No 13 jersey – something Borthwick alluded to earlier this week. Ford came off the bench last week for his first appearance under Borthwick. He has not started for England since the 2021 Six Nations but Borthwick is a keen admirer of his talents and is likely to explore his partnership with Farrell at some stage during the warm-up campaign.
Neither Daly or Henry Arundell appeared in Cardiff so both are likely to feature this weekend, while Anthony Watson is another back-three option. Courtney Lawes could also appear while Joe Marler and Dan Cole are primed for action having also sat out last Saturday’s defeat. Tom Curry is still sidelined with an ankle problem, however.
Meanwhile, Warren Gatland has changed Wales’s entire lineup for Saturday’s fixture, handing a debut to the Scarlets centre Joe Roberts and installing Dewi Lake as his captain. Roberts lines up in midfield with Nick Tompkins while there are also starts for Owen Williams at fly-half, Tom Rogers on the wing and Taine Plumtree – who impressed when winning his first cap off the bench in the win over England – at No 8.
Lake has just eight caps but assumes the captaincy for the first time, just as Jac Morgan did so impressively last weekend. Liam Williams, Josh Adams – who wins his 50th cap – Tomas Francis and Dan Lydiate provide experience to the side.
“There’s an opportunity for another group of players who weren’t involved last week,” said Gatland. “There’s some great competition within the squad. I was pretty pleased with the team performance and the result last week – it wasn’t perfect but there’s a chance now for this group to go out Saturday and to put down their own marker. Like I said, there’s some real competition and perhaps a bit of pressure on this group as well. Then we’ll look potentially at what the make-up of the team is the following week against South Africa.”
Joining Lake and Francis in the front-row is Gareth Thomas, while Rhys Davies wins his third cap at lock alongside Adam Beard. Tommy Reffell completes the back-row at openside flanker while Tomos Williams joins namesake Owen in the halfbacks. The loosehead prop Kemsley Mathias and the Ospreys centre Keiran Williams are also in line for debuts from the bench, where they are joined by Sam Parry, Dillon Lewis, Christ Tshiunza, Taine Basham, Kieran Hardy and Dan Biggar.
