Nick Cain says the tour party to Argentina represents a sea-change for England

The grass-roots setting of Barnes RFC is an unlikely location for game-changing decisions at the apex of the English elite game. However, when Stuart Lancaster chose their humble clubhouse in south-west London as the venue for the announcement of his tour party to Argentina, including a new captain, Tom Wood, and 11 new caps, you were left with the overriding impression of a significant shift.
It indicated that the England head coach has smelt the coffee after England’s no-show at the Millennium Stadium, and recognised that the team that finished second in the Six Nations for a second season in succession are not going to win him the 2015 World Cup.
If that means taking hard decisions, then the England head coach has shown a willingness to take them, starting with this crucial two Test series against the Pumas.
In the backs not only does Freddie Burns get a clear run at the fly-half shirt as the only practising No.10 in the 32-man squad, but Lancaster has also decided to give uncapped Premiership high-performers like Christian Wade, Jonny May, Kyle Eastmond, Joel Tomkins and Marland Yarde, a tilt at international honours.
Lancaster is similarly experimental in the forwards, where he has given tight-head Henry Thomas, hooker Rob Buchanan, lock Ed Slater, blindside Calum Clark, No.8 Billy Vunipola and openside Matt Kvesic a chance to press their cases.
These new names suggest that Lancaster has realised that however much window-dressing was available to him it was never going to be enough to disguise that England’s display in Cardiff fewer than two months ago was short of Test quality in too many departments.
The utterly comprehensive nature of the Welsh victory laid bare a lack of match-winning class at the highest level, and its absence broadcast loudly that, with little more than two years to go until the World Cup, the host nation’s chances of winning it were on a par with the Green Party winning the next General Election.
Lancaster was clear about the impact the defeat had on him, and repeated that it was a profound wake-up call. The result, he admits, is that he wants to expose as many players as he can to Test rugby.
There is no disguising, either, that the logical extension of this policy could result in significant surgery to the England squad that competes against New Zealand, Australia and Argentina in the forthcoming autumn series.
It is clear already that Lancaster’s decision to leave some of his stalwarts of the last two seasons behind, coming hard on the heels of the disappointment of missing out on the Lions, has not gone down well.

Why would it? The likes of Chris Robshaw, Brad Barritt, Danny Care, Toby Flood and Chris Ashton are fiercely competitive, and they know also that the tour to Argentina – especially against a Pumas side well short of full strength – gives their rivals a good chance of making a favourable impression while they have an enforced rest.
However, by sticking to his guns Lancaster has shown that the interests of the team being successful are paramount, and that the close relationships forged within the England camp over the last two seasons are subject to that – and not the other way round.
That’s how it should be, and must be, if England are to add a second World Cup title in 2015 to the one they won in 2003.
It is a harsh arena, and no-one has learned that professional sport takes no prisoners more than Robshaw, who has had a wretched fortnight with a double rebuff from the Lions, and then his country.
You would have to share the same gene-pool as Attila the Hun not to feel sympathy for Robshaw, especially when it was mooted almost immediately that the Six Nations captain could find himself in the same territory as Steve Borthwick. Having been omitted from England’s 2010 tour of Australia by Martin Johnson on the grounds of recovering from injury, Borthwick not only lost the captaincy but also never won another cap.
Robshaw did a good job of pressing his case as a leader through to the World Cup during the Six Nations, but it may not have been quite good enough. Although he played a significant role in England’s victories over New Zealand, Scotland, Ireland and France, his instincts are more blindside flanker than openside.
He made significantly less impact against Italy, and that was also the case in the losses to the Wallabies and Springboks in the autumn, while his failure to turn the tide either as a captain or back row force in the Welsh match did him no favours.
The upshot is that Lancaster is on the hunt for a fast, dynamic openside, with Tom Johnson and Kvesic first in line in Argentina.
However, Robshaw and Borthwick differ in the sense that where the Harlequins flanker has regularly been one of  England’s most prominent players, the Saracens lock hit the high points less often.
My hunch is that even if Robshaw is considered as a No.6 next season by Lancaster, and loses the captaincy after finding himself third in the blindside pecking order to Tom Croft and Wood, he will still be pitching for World Cup honours due to his versatility and work ethic.
Yet, England are in a state of flux, and nothing is set in stone. The Lions may have genuine back-row depth, but all it takes is for a couple of flankers to be injured and for Robshaw to get the call and play out of his skin in the Tests, and the script would be re-written with his place as England captain cemented for next season. The same would probably happen if Lancaster’s new brigade bombed in Argentina. But the odds are not in Robshaw’s favour.
The main reason is that Lancaster’s 32-man squad looks powerful and well-balanced enough to return with a series victory.

The return of Alex Corbisiero at loose-head will strengthen the England scrum, and the Bath pairing of Rob Webber at hooker and David Wilson at tight-head suggests a heavy-duty forward platform.
The rehabilitation of Dave Attwood is also significant, indicating that Lancaster sees the need for a heavyweight lock to balance a second row pairing that looked light and underpowered against Wales. The England head coach pin-pointed Attwood’s development as a line-out leader at Bath as a significant factor in his selection, but another is that at 6ft 7in and more than 18st he is one of the few genuinely big English locks in the Premiership.
He will need to seize his chance for good this time because Slater, one of Lancaster’s other newcomers, has had a barnstorming season. At 6ft 5in and 17st 8lb the Leicester lock is not as big as Attwood, but he is a rugged operator with physical presence, mobility, a high workrate and an aggressive edge to his game.
Lancaster might even be persuaded to pair Attwood and Slater if his forwards coach, Rob Baxter, decides to equip England with a driving maul worth the name for the first time in a decade.
With Wood providing a third line-out option and Ben Morgan restored to No.8, England have a promising blend of power and versatility for Baxter to work with.
Which brings us to openside, and my main disagreement with Lancaster’s selection. The inclusion of Tom Johnson, the 30-year-old Exeter back rower, over Will Fraser (Saracens), Luke Wallace (Harlequins) or Sam Jones (Wasps) – who are the best young No.7s  in the Premiership alongside the Gloucester-bound Kvesic – does not add up.
Johnson is a good blindside, and he has pace, but having seen him in the Test series against South Africa last summer Lancaster should know what he needs to about the Exeter back rower. Namely that he is fast, furious, but not a No.7 breakdown specialist.
However, the England head coach made it clear that he sees Johnson, a No.6 for Exeter who has been unable to get into his club side at No.7 ahead of James Scaysbrook, as a potential openside for the World Cup.
If Lancaster is looking for true opensides he has missed a trick by not taking either Fraser, Wallace or Jones with Kvesic, playing the front-runner in the two Tests against Argentina, and the other contender in the opener against the CONSUR XV.
As Lancaster says, with just 25 matches remaining until the World Cup, he has no time to waste. He has done so at No.7, and it cannot be defended on the grounds that the rest of the back row is inexperienced, because Wood and Morgan are now seasoned Test forwards.
At scrum-half there has also been a tendency to err on the side of caution with Lee Dickson and Richard Wigglesworth both known quantities, whereas the super-fast Joe Simpson (Wasps) and Dan Robson (Gloucester) have a touch of the attacking flair that Lancaster is in search of.
Burns has the field at fly-half to himself, and while Alex Goode provides cover at No.10, it is still a surprise that George Ford is surplus to requirements. The challenge for Burns, meanwhile, is to prove that he has the tactical head to match his playmaking ability.
There can be little quibbling over the selection of the centres. Billy Twelvetrees and Eastmond are very different inside-centres, but exciting ones, and the same can be said for Jonathan Joseph and Tomkins at No.13, although Luther Burrell’s late-season charge must have made Lancaster pause for thought.
In the back three the selection of all the full-back contenders, Ben Foden, Mike Brown and Goode smacks of overkill, and leaves question marks over whether the England coach has parted ways with the concept of fielding a full-back on the wing. Judging from his defence of Brown’s positioning against Alex Cuthbert, perhaps not, which is a pity because the Harlequin is an excellent No.15 but vulnerable on the wing at Test level.
Having written after the France game that Lancaster needed to inject some pace and flair on the wings, with Wade and May as the front-runners, it is good to see them included in the tour party. However, the question remains that if the coach hails them as having the ‘X factor’ now, why did he not trust them to produce it back in March?
Irrespective of these questions, and the desire to see Lancaster be even bolder in his selections, especially at openside, the reality is that he has set in train changes that are likely to overturn the existing pecking-order in a number of areas.
In that eventuality the competition within his squad will become fiercer, and the England coach’s man management skills will face a stern test. However, the decision he has made to explore the playing strength available to him was a tough one, but the right one.