It’s the final weekend of World Cup warm-up matches, and you can find coverage from all of Saturday’s games in The Rugby Paper this Sunday.
England are under huge pressure after another poor performance last Saturday and a week where both their captain, and their only number eight, have been ruled out for their opening game of the World Cup and winger Anthony Watson has been ruled out of the tournament.
Jonny May has come into the England squad for Watson and Courtney Lawes captains the team in Farrell’s absence as he reaches 100 caps for his country, as England face a fired-up Fiji at Twickenham.
Before that, at the same venue, World Rugby’s number two and three ranked teams in New Zealand and South Africa met on Friday night, with the All Blacks suffering their record defeat. You can read an extended report and analysis from that game too.
Elsewhere we’ll be across Scotland vs Georgia, Ireland vs Samoa, Italy vs Japan and Spain vs Argentina, and they’ll be a preview for France vs Australia taking place on Sunday evening.
While the senior teams fire up for their main event, the junior rugby summer is over, and with England U18s’ tour of South Africa now concluded assistant coach Will Parkin shares how the RFU have moved towards a ‘Club England’.
Kyran Bracken’s son Jack was one of the stars of that tour, and although the U18s found success playing vastly more attractive rugby than the senior side, the former England scrum-half shares his sympathy towards senior head coach Steve Borthwick and asks why the English public have turned on their stars like captain Owen Farrell.
In contrast, Jeremy Guscott outlines why he’s so frustrated watching England and points out the areas for that are immediate concerns.
It’s not all plain sailing for Borthwick’s predecessor either, and Paul Rees looks at how Eddie Jones’ Australia are preparing for the World Cup and how the former England boss is keeping the Wallabies in the headlines down under with his bizarre press conference antics.
From the same region of the world, former All Black Carl Hayman says rugby is in denial about player welfare and asks for better education on players injuries.
Back in the Premiership, Josh Bassett opens up about his move to Leicester Tigers from Harlequins, and Bristol Bears scrum-half Andy Uren names the best XV he has played with or against in our Dream Team feature.
And elsewhere amongst our features, Scotland U20s and Cardiff Met University prop Max Surry is our Young Gun, while former cross-code international player Peter Williams looks back on his journey in the game in My Life in Rugby.
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