England Rugby
England lock Geoff Parling has been ruled out of Saturday’s opening November international against Australia at Twickenham with concussion.
Parling was concussed during a training session at England’s training base in Bagshot, south-west of London, on Tuesday and will now follow the standard procedure for players who’ve suffered head injuries.
England prop Alex Corbisiero has been ruled out of his side’s opening November Test against Australia at Twickenham on Saturday.
Corbisiero twisted his left knee playing for club side Northampton just over a fortnight ago and won’t be fit to face the Wallabies.
Five players at English Premiership clubs have tested positive for recreational drug use during the 2012 / 13 season, the Rugby Football Union (RFU) announced on Tuesday.
Seven players will make their first senior starts for England against the Sudamerica XV in Montevideo, Uruguay, on Sunday (19:30 BST – British Summer Time; 20:30 South African Time).
Rob Webber will captain England for the first time in Sunday’s game against the Barbarians at Twickenham. The Bath hooker leads a youthful side which has nine players aged 24 or under in the starting XV and sees Matt Kvesic and Marland Yarde make their debuts.
The snow is deep and crisp and dangerously uneven by health and safety standards, and Jim Telfer is barking out instructions like a rugby regimental sergeant major.
‘Cookie’s a big b*****d,’ Telfer bellows. ‘He thinks he’s tough, OK. Drive him back into the bloody Tweed.’
His young charges do their best to obey against the accompaniment of the coach, who is now transported into a state of quasi-psychotic frenzy, shouting the mantra ‘low, low, low’.
Scotland award a debut to wing Sean Maitland, give a first start in six years to his Glasgow Warriors team-mate Dougie Hall at hooker and recall No 8 Johnnie Beattie in their team for Saturday’s RBS 6 Nations Championship opener against England at Twickenham.
Andy Farrell has called on his “fearless” young England side to record a significant milestone in their development by beating world champions New Zealand on Saturday.
England have dropped Thomas Waldrom, Tom Johnson and Charlie Sharples for Saturday’s Test against South Africa at Twickenham. Forward Joe Marler is also out after straining medial ligaments in his knee in the 20-14 defeat against Australia.
James Haskell and Ben Morgan have both been included in the squad for the first time this autumn. London Irish centre Jonathan Joseph has taken Sharples’ place in the squad after shaking off an ankle injury.
England wing Chris Ashton has been suspended for the start of his country’s November Tests.
England pair Dylan Hartley and Courtney Lawes are doubts for the November Tests after suffering knee injuries in Northampton’s defeat by Saracens.
Flanker Steffon Armitage’s form justifies a place in head coach Stuart Lancaster’s England squad, according to Toulon team-mate Jonny Wilkinson.
Former UK Sport Performance Director Peter Keen and British and Irish Lions legend Ian McGeechan have joined up to work with the RFU to ensure England’s success at the highest level.
England Prop Matt Stevens has announced that he has decided to stand down from International Rugby with immediate effect.
The Southern Hemisphere tours of the Home nations and Ireland are well and truly over by now with almost all of the players from these teams now able to put their feet up for a bit of rest and recuperation after what has been a very long season.
For what it’s worth I thought it would be interesting to see which team had the best tour.
This could be difficult as each team faced different opponents and some had midweek games while others didn’t. To try and take away any bias and subjectivity we have a look at the results as well as the comparative rankings of the teams according to the IRB.
Port Elizabeth – Alex Goode and Thomas Waldrom will make their first starts for England in the third and final Test against South Africa after coach Stuart Lancaster named a side containing six changes on Thursday.
This is the third article in our series looking at players from the northern hemisphere who may be lesser known on the international stage. Previously we looked at two wingers, Harry Robinson and Tim Visser, who at that time had yet to start an official test for their country.
We now feature a forward, England flanker Tom Johnson. The other difference is that by now Johnson has actually played two tests for England, against South Africa.
England play the second of their midweek games on their tour of South Africa against the SA Northern Barbarians team today, Tuesday 19th June. The game will be played at Profet Olen Park Potchefstroom, home of the Leopards. Kick off is at 19.10 SA time.
England head coach Stuart Lancaster is confident his side can bounce back to winning ways in Saturday’s third and final Test against South Africa in Port Elizabeth.
There have been various references made to the inexperience of the Springbok lock pairing for this Saturday’s test match in Durban against England since the announcement of the team.
The England tour of South Africa has already been given a considerable amount of ‘air time’ on this site, and no doubt will continue to feature heavily in the coverage over the coming weeks. This article provides some information on the tours down south of Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
Springbok coach Heyneke Meyer expressed his excitement at the upcoming international season as the national planning camp concluded in Durban today (Monday), with less than two weeks to go before the first Test of the Castle Incoming Tour 2012 against England,
Cape Town – Three players with Springbok Sevens experience have been named in the SA Barbarians teams to take on England in two mid-week matches during next month’s five match tour, the South African Rugby Union (SARU) announced on Monday.
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John Smit has not minced his words in commenting on the ‘special attention’ he expects England’s South African born players to receive on their upcoming tour of South Africa.
It seems at the moment as if we are reaching saturation point with the amount of knockout rugby that we have had of late on these shores. This coming weekend is no exception as we look forward to the finals of the Aviva Premiership and RaboDirect Pro 12 as well as the Barbarians game against England.
Two of South Africa’s most successful coaches – Nick Mallett and Jake White – could go head-to-head in the race for the England job.
England Caretaker Coach Stuart Lancaster has revealed his revised England Elite Player squad which has nine players who have no Test Experience.
The moment Martin Johnson announced his resignation as England manager in mid-November, the attack coach Brian Smith decided he had no option but to do likewise. “It was Martin who had appointed me, so I felt my position was untenable,” he says quietly, reflecting on that supremely difficult moment.
STUART LANCASTER last night sentenced his England squad to community service – after giving Danny Care the boot for drink-driving.
England’s RFU have revealed that Ian Ritchie will become the new Chief Executive Officer of the Rugby Football Union.
The RFU have revealed that Saxons coach Stuart Lancaster will be interim England coach for the 2012 Six Nations championship.
The Rugby Football Union are ready to break the bank in their quest to assemble the “very best” England coaching team.
THE FIRST glint of a fresh start for English rugby may have emerged at Twickenham yesterday as new acting chief executive Stephen Brown apologised for their team’s behaviour and performances at the World Cup and promised a new approach at every level.
With the international season taking a bit of a breather, I thought some informative statistics would be interesting. I am looking at the home record of the top nations, seeing when was the last time they lost a home test to each of the other nations.
I would think any nation would expect at least a 75% home win record as the minimm standard to attain. anything less would mean your home ground advantage counts for very little and travelling teams do not find it a daunting task to tour.
As a follow up to yesterday’s post, here are some of the comments given by the players questioned in the report, and boy, did they have a lot to say.