Academy trio retain England U20 starting spots

Thursday, June 24th 2021

Jack Bates, Deago Bailey and Alex Groves have all retained their starting spots for England U20's Six Nations clash with Scotland at Cardiff Arms Park on Friday (2pm KO, live on England Rugby Facebook page, Six Nations Rugby YouTube channel and S4C Clic.

Alan Dickens names an unchanged back line following the five-try, bonus-point 38–22 win against France last week. Jack van Poortvliet again captains the side from scrum half.

Dickens said: “It’s been a good week preparing for Friday’s match and the players have recovered well after a physical game against France last weekend.

“We’ve made a few changes in the forwards for this match. I was impressed with the impact that those four players had when they came on last week and wanted to give them starts this time out.

“We were fortunate to have a couple of training matches against Scotland in Newcastle a few weeks ago which was really helpful and we know they will pose a challenge. But it’s also about focusing on ourselves and ensuring we are ready to play what’s in front of us.

“The players are coming together well as a group. We had 12 U20 debutants in the starting line-up for the last match, but I was very impressed with the way they handled themselves particularly coming back from 19-3 down.

“The players worked out where they needed to tactically adapt and they did it. We know that will again be important when we play Scotland.”

Due to COVID-19 regulations teams are permitted to name a squad of 26 players for each fixture in this year’s competition. Teams can use eight of the 11 replacements named in a squad during the match.

ENGLAND U20 XV

15 Orlando Bailey (Bath Rugby)
14 Deago Bailey (Bristol Rugby)
13 Jack Bates (Bristol Rugby)
12 Dan Lancaster (Leeds Tykes)
11 Arthur Relton (Exeter Chiefs)
10 Fin Smith (Worcester Warriors)
9 Jack van Poortvliet (Leicester Tigers) (C)

1 Phil Brantingham (Newcastle Falcons)
2 Sam Riley (Harlequins)
3 Harvey Kindell-Beaton (Saracens)
4 Ewan Richards (Bath Rugby)
5 Alex Groves (Bristol Bears)
6 Emeka Ilione (Leicester Tigers)
7 Lucas Brooke (London Irish)
8 Jack Clement (Gloucester Rugby)

REPLACEMENTS

16 John Stewart (Bath Rugby)
17 Tarek Haffar (London Irish)
18 Luke Green (London Irish)
19 Arthur Clark (Gloucester Rugby)
20 Harry Taylor (Gloucester Rugby)
21 Nahum Merigan (Bath Rugby)
22 Raffi Quirke (Sale Sharks)
23 Tommy Mathews (unattached)
24 Phil Cokanasiga (London Irish)
25 Tom Litchfield (Northampton Saints)
26 Charlie Atkinson (Wasps)

ENGLAND’S U20 SIX NATIONS FIXTURES