Ellis Genge impresses in the heat of battle, Saracens end tough week on a high and Marland Yarde spearheads Sale’s late pushLoosehead prop is not a problem position for England with Mako Vunipola backed up by Joe Marler, but Beno Obano and Ellis Genge are World Cup pretenders and rivals for a place in the World Cup squad next year. They stood out at Twickenham in their different ways: Genge was dominant in the scrum, pulverising Shaun Knight to create the platform for Leicester’s victory, while Obano was prominent in the loose, making 15 tackles and carrying hard to make more metres with ball in hand than any other Bath forward on a day when Leicester dominated possession. Genge has...
Bath are facing catastrophe, Ellis Genge offers grounds for English optimism and Josh McNally makes a poignant returnAnother home defeat in the Premiership for Bath, whose season is now in grave danger of unravelling. It may have taken a late Joe Simmonds penalty for Exeter but after a bright start to the campaign Bath’s inconsistency has been their downfall and they occupy eighth place in the table. They will most likely have to win all four of their remaining matches to reach the play-offs and failure to qualify for the Champions Cup would be an unmitigated disaster. Bath have not been helped by injuries but there have been times this season when Todd Blackadder’s frustration at his players’ inability to...
In their most challenging season this decade, Sarries face Leinster in the Champions Cup on Easter Sunday looking to do what Eddie Jones’ men could not – beat an Irish sideLast May, English rugby celebrated a double double. Saracens retained the European Champions Cup a couple of months after England had held on to the Six Nations title. In two years, they had lost one match between them in the tournaments, the international against Ireland in Dublin that March.Five Saracens were involved in England’s 2017 Six Nations campaign, a sixth, George Kruis, was named with the quintet in the Lions’ squad for the tour to New Zealand – Billy Vunipola pulled out – and a seventh, Alex Lozowski, went on...
Saracens became the only Premiership club to gain a European Champions Cup quarter-final place, Scarlets were the comeback kids and injuries made grim viewing for GatlandWasps must be kicking themselves for their late capitulation at Harlequins the previous weekend for there can be little doubt it was at the Stoop where their hopes of reaching the knockout stages disappeared. To their credit they produced perhaps their best performance of their campaign to eliminate Ulster, securing an emphatic bonus point win only to come up just short as they and Exeter finished as the two runners-up who failed to qualify. In doing so they may have also answered a few critics who could suggest they are a fairweather team – scoring...
Manu Tuilagi needs more time to recapture his best form while Wales’s Josh Adams is at the top of his game and will deserve a first Six Nations call-upBecause it is Manu Tuilagi, the question had to be asked, but if he were picked for England now it would be more on faith than form, notwithstanding the cheeky and acrobatic manner in which he leapt over a writhing mass of bodies to score Leicester’s third try in their victory against London Irish at Welford Road on Saturday. Tuilagi had also played a part in their second try, but that was more in the vein of a Keystone Cop. “We need to have a realistic view of Manu,” said Matt O’Connor,...