As his close confidant and the first person to find out, Dan Cole was not entirely surprised when Joe Marler told him of his international retirement. Indeed Marler’s decision provoked an altogether different reaction. “He explained his reasons and all that, and I thought: ‘Who the fuck am I going to room with, Joe!? You’ve stitched me up here!’”
It turns out George Ford is the lucky recipient of Marler’s bed but more significantly, it is Sale’s 20-year-old prop Asher Opoku-Fordjour who takes his place in the squad. As Cole says, he will miss Marler, but the world keeps turning. He questions whether, at 37, he still belongs at the highest level almost on a daily basis and Steve Borthwick’s decision to hand the highly-rated Opoku-Fordjour a first call-up is symbolic of the changing of the guard.
