Young Gun: Max Malins – England U20s full-back

Making the step up from schools rugby is not an easy one, but Max Malins has taken it in his stride by proving an instant hit with Old Albanians.
The Saracens playmaker left Felsted school last summer and joined the club’s academy on a full-time basis.
On the back of captaining their U18s side to the Premiership Academy title and touring South Africa with England U18s, Malins has had his first taste of senior rugby this campaign in National League Two with OAs where he is dual-registered.
The 19-year-old admits he as had to quickly make changes to his game but with 12 tries and 136 pointsto his name, he has been a key figure in OAs’ rise to the top of the table.
“The season’s been going very well and it’s been great for me to get my first taste of senior rugby with OAs,” he told The Rugby Paper.
“It’s been very good for my development as a young player. The physicality was a big shock at the start of the season but I got better as I got more confident.
“There’s a lot less space so I’m working hard on identifying the gaps. I train with Saracens every day and it’s great to see how Owen Farrell and Charlie Hodgson go about their training and even lifestyle really.
“I’ve been working on my game management a lot because at school you just play from anywhere, but you have to manage the game better in senior rugby and kicking is sometimes the better option.
“You don’t get as many chances to score or bounce back from a mistake so you’ve got to be very clinical.
“I played a couple of A-league games this season too, so making my Premiership debut is my next target. But I don’t think it’ll happen this season as I have a lot of physical development to do in order to be ready to play at that level.”
His impressive performances at club level were rewarded by Jon Callard who selected him in his England U20s EPS for the Six Nations and Malins made his debut on Friday starting at full-back in Italy.
He added: “It’s nice to go back to playing with boys my age who have the same aspirations as me. We’re all in the same boat here and it’s very exciting to be together again and see how we’ve improved.
“There are a lot of us from the U18s so we potentially have two years together and I’m very much looking forward to it.
“I don’t think we’re out of our depth being a year young. We just need to be more accurate when we create chances because, like in senior rugby, you have to make every single one of them count at U20s level.”