Peter Jackson: Rookie 10s can shape outcome of Six Nations

The Six Nations cast for 2014 includes seven fly-halves who have yet to play in the tournament and seven more who cannot be sure of their place. Never can so many No. 10 Test novices with so few caps have been assembled on the starting grid for the Grand Old Championship. The mass stand-off featuring Europe’s best young play-makers will determine the tactical shape of the entire 15-match show, for better or worse.
Three short years ago, England, Ireland and Wales put their strategic plan in the hands of a trio of veterans with more than 300 caps between them – Jonny Wilkinson, Ronan O’Gara and Stephen Jones.
Nobody could have imagined that their subsequent passing into honourable Test retirement would begin a rejuvenation process which has changed the entire fly-half landscape. It has been hastened by the fact that three of the more experienced surviving practitioners – Toby Flood, Frederic Michalak, Francois Trinh-Duc – have been declared surplus to requirements by England and France respectively.
Instead the countries who collide in Paris on Saturday week have picked six fly-halves between them – Jules Plisson, Remi Tales and Jean-Marc Doussain for France; Owen Farrell, George Ford and Stephen Myler for England.
Five have yet to appear in the Six Nations, leaving Farrell the odd man out.
Ford, the youngest of the quintet at 20, joins the England squad as Farrell’s leading challenger, having leap-frogged the French-bound Flood and Leicester’s imminent capture from Gloucester, Freddie Burns.
Myler, his time on the Test stage limited to 15 minutes against Argentina in Buenos Aires last summer, is the third man in the English equation. He at least has 15 minutes more under his belt than the French rookies Doussain and Plisson.
Tales, the man in possession after a torrid initiation in New Zealand last summer, won his cap at the age of 29 after a ten-year apprenticeship with Mont-de-Marsan, La Rochelle and his current club, Castres.
He has yet to play in the Six Nations and the same goes for the youngest No. 10 of all, Tommaso Allan. Italy‘s 20-year-old, six weeks younger than Ford, is in line to continue against Wales in Cardiff on Saturday week where he left off against Argentina in Rome two months ago.
Nobody will be more peeved about that than Scotland. Allan, born in Vicenza to a Scottish father and an Italian mother, had played for all their under-age teams before deciding to switch allegiance earlier in the season, hence the change from Tommy to Tommaso.
His uncle, John Allan, did something similar during the first half of the Nineties.   He hooked for Scotland in nine Tests, then returned to his native South Africa to play 13 more for the Springboks before the IRB declared it illegal to represent more than one country.
Allan, junior, has flourished at Perpignan this season despite having been in competition with his mentor, James Hook.    “He’s such a nice guy,” Allan said the other week.  “He’s always there if I need some advice.”
Hook, a fly-half by trade, has been virtually frozen out of his favourite position by Wales. He last started there in the Six Nations three years ago and will not be holding his breath about resuming any time soon unless Dan Biggar and Rhys Priestland are unavailable.
At an age when he ought to be at the peak of his considerable powers, Hook will continue to suffer for his versatility, as emergency cover at full-back, inside centre and fly-half. Wales would probably have pushed him further down their
pecking order at No. 10 had their newly-capped 20-year-old Cardiff Blue, Rhys Patchell, not been eliminated for the season following surgery.