Quartet at the ready to answer Lancaster’s call

A QUARTET of Yorkshiremen are in the frame to help England build on their winning start to the Autumn Internationals.
Rob WebberRob Webber
Rob Webber

Danny Care, Luther Burrell, Rob Webber and Geoff Parling were all named last night by Stuart Lancaster in an extended 27-man squad for their second appointment of the QBE Series against Argentina.

Pocklington-born Webber and Stockton-on-Tees-born Parling have the best chance of making the final 23-man squad which will be named by Lancaster tomorrow morning.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Webber, the Leeds Carnegie academy graduate, has been brought in as cover at hooker while first-choice No 2 Tom Youngs awaits the imminent birth of his first child.

Dylan Hartley would be the man to move into the first team with Webber – who captained England in a no-cap Test with the Barbarians in the summer – likely to be named on the bench.

Leicester Tigers and British and Irish Lions lock Parling returns after being withdrawn from the squad to face Australia last week because he suffered a concussion, an injury which brings with it a minimum seven-day recovery period.

Huddersfield-born Burrell makes it past the first cull for the first time in the three weeks the England squad have been gathered, but with Lancaster saying on Monday that he will give Billy Twelvetrees another chance at inside centre despite his struggles against the Wallabies, it looks like the former Leeds battering ram may miss out again.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

And Care will be relying on his efforts in training to catch the eye of his former club boss Lancaster, who at present sees Lee Dickson and Ben Youngs as his first-choice scrum-halves.

Elsewhere, Alex Corbisiero’s return from a knee injury is particularly timely given the man he was set to challenge for loosehead prop duties – Mako Vunipola – is suffering with a knee ligament strain.

Lancaster said: “We have thoroughly reviewed the Australia game and we are determined to build on the momentum that victory has given us.

“Training has been very intense and there is a massive competition because everyone is desperate to be in the team.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“There are a couple of changes to the squad with Geoff and Alex back and it’s great they are back in the mix. Mako is unfortunately struggling with a ligament strain to his knee and is not available for selection this week.

“We have named an extended squad as we need a further 24 hours to assess one or two minor niggles in the build-up to team announcement on Thursday morning.”

The enforced switch at loosehead should not cause too much disruption, with England’s tighthead prop Dan Cole expecting a ferocious scrum battle at Twickenham no matter who is in the line-up.

Forwards coach Graham Rowntree has warned his pack the tourists will attempt to grind them into submission at the set-piece, which they view as their key weapon.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

While scrums against other teams last in the region of six seconds, against Argentina a further two and a half seconds elapse before the ball is released.

The phrase ‘scrum duration’ figured prominently during training yesterday as Rowntree outlined the Pumas’ desire to “punish” and fatigue England.

Cole has been given an insight into Argentina’s mentality through Leicester team-mate Marcos Ayerza – the respected loosehead he must subdue in the second of three November fixtures for Lancaster’s men.

“They want to scrum you out. They want to wear you out and take you on there,” said Cole.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“They pride themselves on the scrum. They pride themselves on the gentlemanly way of pushing you backwards for a long period of time. If you don’t get it right, they are good.

“When you speak to Marcos, who is versed in the Argentinian way, you find out there is a certain pride and honour in the way they scrum. They don’t like cheating.

“It’s a pushing context and the team that gives up, goes backwards. That is the gentlemanly way of doing it. It’s good, it’s effective.”

Cole insists Argentina’s patient approach to exposing weaknesses can be very rewarding.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

“In scrum you are never at 70-80 per cent, you are flat out, you are pushing as hard as you can,” he said.

“Argentina try to outlast you and wait for a team to give up. They are there, static, waiting for someone to move. As soon as someone does that and it’s in the wrong direction, that’s when there is a crack and that’s what they’ll exploit. It wears you out.

“The human body is not designed to be pushed backwards for long periods of time. The front five can’t run about – the lactic acid builds up in their legs.”

As well as Ayerza, Argentina have selected other seasoned campaigners such as Patricio Albacete and Juan Manuel Leguizamon as they look to gain revenge on England for the two defeats they suffered on home soil in the summer.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The Pumas may have lost stars Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe and Juan Martin Hernandez to injury, but they have still picked a starting XV containing 417 caps.

That number is 204 more than England fielded in last Saturday’s 20-13 victory over Australia and all but two players are at Aviva Premiership or French clubs.

“It’s important to have experience in many areas of the team,” said Pumas coach Daniel Hourcade.

Related topics: