England have been preparing for Saturday’s final Six Nations match, against France, by perfecting their chop tackles to avoid another nightmare red-card scenario in Paris, and Eddie Jones has left Max Malins out of his squad to face Les Bleus.
Charlie Ewels was sent off after 82 seconds in Saturday’s defeat by Ireland for an upright, head-on-head collision with James Ryan– deemed a dangerous tackle by the referee, Mathieu Raynal. As a result Jones’s squad have this week been focusing on their tackle technique and ensuring they go low against the grand-slam chasing French.
Jones, meanwhile, has left Malins – one of only three players to appear in every minute of England’s campaign to date – out of the 28-man squad that flew to Paris on Tuesday. The 25-year-old was impressive against Italy in round two but, with England managing a combined total of only two tries against Scotland, Wales and Ireland, Malins has seemingly paid the price for their misfiring attack. Elliot Daly would appear the favourite to take his place on the wing but Louis Lynagh, Luke Northmore and George Furbank have also travelled to France.
Jack Willis has returned to Wasps after briefly joining the squad, strongly suggesting Sam Underhill will replace the injured Tom Curry at openside flanker, while Nic Dolly is set to come on to the bench in place of Jamie Blamire, who has been left out after a botched lineout throw late on against Ireland. Alfie Barbeary is again among the 28 as the 21-year-old waits for a debut.
Whichever way Jones shuffles his side, they have been given a clear reminder of the need to be accurate with their tackles. “It is probably something that everyone needs to work on anyway, the height in tackle,” said the No 8 Sam Simmonds. “Against a huge French pack you don’t want to be going too high against them anyway. It is something we talked about this week.
Leicester Tigers have avoided a points deduction but been fined more than £300,000 following a salary cap investigation by Premiership Rugby. The Tigers were deemed to have failed to comply with salary cap regulations for five consecutive seasons and while their financial penalty is, by a distance, the second largest in history behind Saracens, they will be relieved that harsher punishment was not forthcoming.
PRL’s investigation found that Leicester entered into an arrangement with a third party who made payments to the image rights companies of Leicester players. Those payments, made over the four seasons from 2016-17 to 2019-20, should have been disclosed within the salary cap but were not.
Leicester escaped formal charges – such as a points deduction – however, because the salary cap was exceeded by less than the “overrun” limit (£325,000 in the first season and £350,000 thereafter). Their highest overrun was £147,750.
That has left the Tigers with an overrun tax bill of £291,941.06, plus an additional fine of £17,900 for failing to disclose information regarding the arrangement. Last season Leicester were deemed to be under the salary cap but the fine includes non-disclosure during that campaign. PRL’s salary cap manager Andrew Rogers said: “While we are satisfied that the arrangements which resulted in the overspend have been brought to an end, we will continue to assess all spending as part of our ongoing monitoring process at every club.” Gerard Meagher
“Our chop tackles need to be good and our second man needs to be good to wrap the ball up as well because they love to offload the ball, they are very good in unstructured play. That is probably where they get most of their momentum, offloads and unstructured and they are very good at that. That is something we have talked about this week, our tackle height and just chopping the big fellas down, making them get up and hopefully they tire towards the end of the game.”
Defeat in Paris could leave England in fifth place in the Six Nations table for the second year in a row and would heighten the pressure on Jones. On Monday, Jones acknowledged the extra scrutiny he is facing, suggesting it was, in part, because he is Australian, but Simmonds was adamant the head coach has the backing of the squad regardless of Saturday’s result.
“I feel like, as a group, probably this campaign more than any other we’ve come together as a squad,” he added. “Although that maybe hasn’t been reflected in the results against Scotland and Ireland, I feel like people could see at Twickenham what it meant for us to play for England. Also we’re not just playing for England, we’re playing for the coaches. That’s big to see that, and how much confidence we have in what Eddie does and in how we play the game at the weekend.”
