The three-horse race to win a place in Eddie Jones’s first squad is hotting up ahead of Australia’s Rugby World Cup campaignRugby is a tough game played by hard athletes but it’s true powerbase isn’t muscle. Rather it is twinkling toes and magic hands that puts points on the scoreboard and gets bums on seats. It’s why the heart of every great team is a playmaker – someone who makes things happen, a creative genius who can execute basic skills brilliantly and also conjure the extraordinary.A cut-out ball that hits a player on the fly, the popped pass to a raging bull on a crazy angle, a flick or feint, a dummy or double-pump. Hands, eyes, imagination in a harmony...
Our best XV of this campaign contains players ranging from the experienced Owen Farrell to rising stars such as Cadan Murley15 Santiago Carreras (Gloucester)The 25-year-old Puma has had a remarkable past nine months. Helping Argentina to beat the All Blacks in New Zealand and England at Twickenham is a double to cherish and, having also worn the No 10 and 11 jerseys for Gloucester, the inventive playmaker had to be squeezed into this team somewhere. “It could sound quite arrogant but I want to be the best player in the world,” he said earlier this season. He is already an eye-catching talent.14 Mateo Carreras (Newcastle)No relation to his compatriot but the Tucumán-born winger has made a similarly positive impression on...
Club struggles in a shifting financial landscape mean it is harder to attract top overseas players to the English domestic gameStarter for 10: has the Premiership ever seen a more naturally-gifted player than Charles Piutau? Others have scored more tries, made more tackles or influenced their team’s fortunes more significantly, but has there ever been anyone to match Piutau’s capacity to thrill, to produce those moments that stir the senses?On Saturday he makes his last appearance for Bristol against Gloucester after five years at the club. He arrived to great fanfare, the first £1m player and as the totem of the Premiership’s marquee player policy, but the ledger will show only a qualified success. He was injured at the start...
Red Roses captain pivotal in quelling French revival and winning her first Six Nations title since taking the roleRibcages shook as the baseline dropped. Boom. Boom. Boom. The vibrations matched the march of the teams coming out. Fireworks blasted red and white into the sky and Taylor Swift’s familiar voice sang: “Are you ready for it?” The world record crowd definitely were and it is a good job Twickenham does not have a roof or it would need repairing as these teams are used to breaking the glass ceiling.England rugby’s reputation needed some patching at their home, given that the last time a team frequented this grass the men were booed off after being destroyed by France in March. If...
As the squad of a generation breaks up, Exeter travel to La Rochelle with their eyes on a Champions Cup finalThey know a little bit about vintage years in Bordeaux, where Exeter hope to savour a famous victory over La Rochelle on Sunday. This has not been the smoothest of seasons for the Chiefs but there is still time to transform perceptions. If few people are tipping England’s last men standing as probable Champions Cup finalists, that is exactly how they prefer it.The more you examine the background to the fixture, in fact, the more intriguing it becomes. Does anyone remotely think Sam Simmonds, Jack Nowell, Stuart Hogg or any of the Chiefs’ other departing gladiators are not desperate for...