What makes steward special is his size and athleticism. Plenty of fullbacks good in the air, not a lot of guys playing centre that size who are English
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England 2022/23
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Who have we got at FB who is reliable in the air and plays regularly?
Bath - De Glanville (does he fill you with confidence?)
Bristol - Malins (possibly if he gets a run, but needs to start regularly)
Exeter - Hodge (young and largely untested)
Gloucester - ?
Harlequins - ?
Leicester - Steward
Irish - Arundell (very untested and needs a club)
Newcastle - ?
Northampton - Furbank and Freeman (maybe Freeman if he starts regularly at 15, but not Furbank)
Sale - Carpenter (again very untested)
Sarries - Goode (well he ain't going to be picked now)
Not sure where we have 'plenty' of fullbacks good in the air.
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If I was feeling mischievous I'd be duty bound to mention Brown and Watson.
Steward's absolutely fine and FB is the least of our problems. Whichever individuals are picked, knitting the whole together is the perennial challenge.
Jordie has been a success as he interchanges easily.
NZ have always developed interchangeable players, whereas, like in football, England typecast a player and then restrict them.
Look at the NZ back row, very few of the players would be limited to 1 position
Yeah, but Watson doesn't actually play FB in reality and Brown is in the same situation as Goode.
Is Steward the saviour from on high? No. But he's pretty rock solid and out of all the positions that need fixing, 15 is the least of our problems as you say, so why make it a problem by moving him to solve another problem?
If Steward was 2nd choice then maybe, but moving your starting fullback to fix the centres without a reliable back up is just silly.
Personally that's more because NZ players often have better all round skills so the drop is less noticeable. They still will have a more specialised area. It was Jones who wanted his players to do everything and it didn't work.
Further as I said above, looking at swapping player positions is not going to solve England's problems. Yes some positions are weaker than others, but it's the team as a whole. Shifting Steward would change nothing in a team that is not functioning properly.
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Tbh I don't think centre is such a problem in the sense of shortage of players who could do fine there. I think the issue is tactically we are just very poor at backs play. Lawrence looked good at centre, we have Tuilagi as a potential bashing 12 (I know he plays 13 more). I think the issue is that the position has been woefully under-developed due to years of Jones looking at nothing except Farrell, with the odd period of Slade-Tuilagi (which did look good tbh). We have perfectly viable options and I don't see how we could have complained about Jones playing players out of position only to then decide to take a 15 and chuck him in a position he is not familiar with just because of his physical characteristics. Positional familiarity is much more important than being a big lump.
We need to just give players a chance and Kelly likely would have already had his if not for injury. We have maybe 4 or 5 choices who we could look at there / who have shown they can play there without moving Steward.
We need to just give players a chance and Kelly likely would have already had his if not for injury. We have maybe 4 or 5 choices who we could look at there / who have shown they can play there without moving Steward.
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Really?
I'd say we've the opposite issue where we're forcing players outside of their best positions in the name of flexibility
Why does Tom Curry have multiple starts at 8 for England?
Marchant, Malins and Manu have all started on the wing internationally
All our backrows, outside of Dombrandt/Vunipola, have played all across the backrow - most of our locks have games in the backrow,
Flyhalves playing 12, fullbacks on the wing, centres interchanging between 12/13
EJ trying to develop players in multiple roles as mentioned above.
At club level, there seems to be a drive to pigeon hole players.
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Good, I'd rather specialists than generalists
Jack of all trades master of none
EJs obsession with utility players was to his detriment and it damaged the trajectory of multiple players
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Me too, although I'm in fully in favour of players wearing different shirts at club level….particularly in the outside backs, for a couple of reasons.
Sometimes a player's best position isn't always what people might have thought. Only by playing at 13 did we find out that was Slade's best position and few would have thought that. Lawes started out as a lock and now most people wouldn't even consider playing him there.
Rugby players seem to specialise very early. This is a big complaint in athletics too where we quite often see later career switches - prodigious 200m runners become better at 400m, 1500m specialists turn to the 5K etc and a select few become world class in a couple of events and can switch between them with equal facility.
Also, if a player is caught out of position say a 10 in the 13 channel he needs to know what to do in that position whether in defence or attack. That's easier if they've actually played there.
But at international level someone should clearly have an absolute 'specialist' position. But the ability to cover others in the event of injury or to step in well in open play is invaluable.
IIRC in Aus's glory days when they didn't have a pack their backs were as close to numbers on shirts not mattering as I've ever seen.
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Yep I am also of the view a player needs to have their core specialist position where they start the game, but also have the ability to cover another if required.
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Even simpler than this; you only get 3 back subs. You have to have at least a few of your backs able to cover multiple positions or you're gonna find yourself in deep water very quickly.
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Why can't Borthwick just announce a wider training squad I'm bored af
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we can always talk about Ford v Farrell again if you like?
For a little light relief, we can even bring Smith into the conversation.
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I really hope Ford isn't involved unless he's the third choice FH.
I guess we could speculate on who gets injured in camp as well and if there will be any bolters in the squad.
I guess we could speculate on who gets injured in camp as well and if there will be any bolters in the squad.
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Can't see Ford not going as second, maybe even first, choice FH tbh
Could see Smith not even going to the world cup if Borthwick buys into EJ's idea of Furbank being viable international 10 cover, tbh
That's the impression I get from Ford's immediate callup to the England squad and Smith not making it off the bench vs Ireland, anyway
Could see Smith not even going to the world cup if Borthwick buys into EJ's idea of Furbank being viable international 10 cover, tbh
That's the impression I get from Ford's immediate callup to the England squad and Smith not making it off the bench vs Ireland, anyway
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I assume you mean you can see Ford as first or second choice?
I definitely could too. Borthwick's only ***le was won with Ford as his 10. He knows exactly what he can do and unless we are planning to take a massive change of direction, Ford is the best equipped to deliver his gameplan. I really don't want to open up a can of worms here, but Ford/Farrell has worked at times whereas Smith/Farrell hasn't worked at all.
I see Smith going as 3rd choice and I suspect he may only feature against Chile unless Ford or Farrell are unavailable. I could easily see him being left out though.
Is Furbank even in Borthwick's thoughts? I don't think he was in the mix for the 6N was he?
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Yeah, don't think Furbank is anywhere near Borthwick's mind right now. I'm expecting all three of Faz, Ford and Smith to go, probably in that order. But, if Borthwick was to only take 2 then I think it would be Faz and Ford with Malins covering (I'm much more confident about all 3 going though).
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