England Vs France

Burt has announced it'll be the same match day squad as was used in Dublin to take on the French at home.

Starting XV will be announced tomorrow. Might be changes at 1, 2 and 12/13. Tempted to say Lawes is rumoured to start, but in fairness that would just be to rile Beard.

A worthwhile reason to base any selection choice!

Anyway, Lawes is awesome........5.......4.......3......2......

It's all fun and games until the Daily Mail states that Lawes will be starting... at 6, in place of Haskell.

Now assuming this is true, I think Launchbury has made more starts at 6 than Lawes, but I guess his scrummaging must be thought of more highly than Lawes if true.

EDIT - Also Manu in for 36, 36 on the bench. Not a bad call in my mind, if France find their magic, I think the tried and tested is probably smart, Manu can stop Bastardeau too.

EDIT EDIT - Waldrom on the bench (Haskell too of course).

EDIT EDIT EDIT (now I'm just having fun) - Hartley in place of Youngs too, I reckon that's in respect to the french scrum too.

Odd, very odd.

We've seen the problems France are having with less mobility in their pack, and if the Mail is right we're going to try and echo that. Also we'd have no recognised serious carriers in the pack, in the absence of Youngs and Morgan, and only one of those would be a forced exclusion.

Perhaps they want to try something very different. But that's a move away what's been making us work in the last few games. Having only one winger, and no cover for the wing remains our thing it would seem, so that's just odd and not newly odd.

Also as they announced the same 23 that means Lawes covering lock whilst starting at 6, and Haskell and Waldrom on the bench.

I don't know how many games don't see at least one lock replaced by fresh legs, but this would be very much the exception not the rule. Perhaps this shows the tight five are actually pretending they have to work hard.

I reckon we want to HULK SMASH them in the first half, let Lawes just break as many people as possible, give Manu a chance to knock the wind out of fat bastardeaux, and Brad to make sure that even if the french do start firing, they don't get anything out of it.

Lawes gives us another big lineout option, Hartley is more reliable (though Youngs has done very well recently) in the lineout, plus Hartley is good in the scrum. I reckon we're trying to grab the set piece, and just neutralise the French at first, then start to push on in the 2nd half.

Domingo will surely start for the them so their scrum will be better. But he's tiny, and so far their lineout hasn't been brilliant, so why a short prop will make it a thing to be feared....

If they want to play Harltey, and I get that, it does mean Manu has to play to get a carrier in the team. But I'd also replace Marler with Vunipola too, not having Youngs and Morgan will be an issue

I agree Raggs - I'm looking forward to seeing Manu try and smash Bastardreau too

Lawes can put some huge hits in but he showed poor technique in one tackle vs the irish -can't remember if he had to come off after that or not ?

i want Illegitimate Love Child to get naileeed

HAHA good one raggs i forgot about that word turned into

So what I've been reading suggests Fofana at 12 and Bastardeaux at 13. That's going to be a fantastic test of Barrits defence, and Manus strength. Should be very nice to watch.

Thomas Domingo
Benjamin Kayser
Nicolas Mas
Christophe Samson
Yoann Maestri
Yannick Nyanga
Thierry Dusautoir (capt)
Louis Picamoles
Morgan Parra
Francois Trinh-Duc
Benjamin Fall
Wesley Fofana
Mathieu Bastareaud
Vincent Clerc
Yoann Huget

Les remplaçants: Dimitri Szarzewski, Vincent Debaty, Luc Ducalcon, Jocelino Suta, Antonie Claassen, Maxime Machenaud, Frederic Michalak, Florian Fritz.

Big surprise is the inclusion of Samson, and pressure now really falls on Picamoles and Bastareaud with the halves having been changed.

England: 15. Alex Goode (Saracens, 8 caps); 14. Chris Ashton (Saracens, 31 caps), 13. Manusamoa Tuilagi (Leicester Tigers, 18 caps), 12. Brad Barritt (Saracens, 13 caps), 11. Mike Brown (Harlequins, 13 caps); 10. Owen Farrell (Saracens, 14 caps), 9. Ben Youngs (Leicester Tigers, 30 caps); 1. Joe Marler (Harlequins, 7 caps), 2. Dylan Hartley (Northampton Saints, 44 caps), 3. Dan Cole (Leicester Tigers, 37 caps), 4. Joe Launchbury (London Wasps, 6 caps), 5. Geoff Parling (Leicester Tigers, 14 caps), 6. Courtney Lawes (Northampton Saints, 17 caps), 7. Chris Robshaw (Harlequins, capt, 14 caps), 8. Tom Wood (Northampton Saints, 15 caps).
Replacements: 16. Tom Youngs (Leicester Tigers, 6 caps), 17. David Wilson (Bath Rugby, 24 caps), 18. Mako Vunipola (Saracens, 6 caps), 19. James Haskell (London Wasps, 47 caps), 20. Thomas Waldrom (Leicester Tigers, 5 caps), 21. Danny Care (Harlequins, 38 caps), 22. Toby Flood (Leicester Tigers, 54 caps), 23. Billy Twelvetrees (Gloucester, 2 caps)

I think Danny Care should start after his man of the match performance against Leicester!

Is that worth more than what could well have been awarded the MoM performance from Ben Youngs away in Dublin?

As much as I prefer Care over Youngs, Youngs should keep his starting position after his fantastic work in Dublin.

France worry me, with the Trinh-Duc, Parra combination. Then again I am always pessimistic when it comes to England.

I agree with Raggs, Young should start as he has been playing well recently for England. As a former mouthy scum half (before my left ankle gave up in my early '20's), I actually dislike them both which is slightly ironic. Lancaster is lucky to have them both at the moment, Youngs has stepped up his game and England actually look for quick ball for once. Good to see Tuilagi back, I have said it before, as I don't rate 36 that highly. My mates and I used to have a good laugh at his expense when we used to watch him at Welford Road. He always seemed to be one of those players that if he starts a match poorly then there is no recovery which is a worry at this level.

eadie wrote: I have said it before, as I don't rate 36 that highly. My mates and I used to have a good laugh at his expense when we used to watch him at Welford Road. He always seemed to be one of those players that if he starts a match poorly then there is no recovery which is a worry at this level.

He started the Scotland game awfully, and didn't seem to let it get him down.

Lawes at 6 is a definite No No then. He loves the big hits, but he mostly got the big misses. Leave him as an impact sub where his big hits are going for people who've slowed down already. But Launchbury had another great game (I read somewhere more tackles than Robshaw!) and is not leaving his starting shirt at the moment.

Hartley seemed to offer bugger all over Youngs for me. Perhaps the solidity he's been giving the scrums in previous matches is mostly just fresh legs over tired ones.

Care had the better game this time I reckon, but Youngs wasn't bad (couple of chargedowns though).

Wood and Robshaw both had great games again.

Farrell has a bit of the devil in him, though he may need to watch it, or at least start being smarter with it.

We didn't use Tuilagi enough, I remember seeing him get the ball 3 times. Once was the try, a second was a fantastic run making a lot of meters, and the third was the ball thrown at his feet by Farrell, and he still made yards.

Would have liked to have seen 36 get a run around, but I think once we had the lead and seemed to be on the up, keeping Barritt in place was the smart choice.

Can we drop Ashton already? He was our best finisher, he is not any more. We're keeping Varndell out because he's not a great tackler, but he would have at least rode on Fofanas back and slowed him down. We're keeping Wade out because of his positional defence, but it doesn't matter if Ashton is in the right place, because he doesn't do anything. I think the best comment I read was that Ashton did a beautiful sidestep against Fofana, it was just unfortunate that Fofana was the one with the ball.

I just get the feeling this side isn't a team of players who are in the top 3 for their position (outside of maybe one or two), but that have great mental toughness, and just work bloody hard.

Agree, but what Burt has done is select a team that (usually) doesn't give away the stupid penalties. Think back a few years and they probably were the best players for the positions but some of them (especially in the forwards) didn't have the temperament and composure for that level and everytime they got any go-forward ball it resulted in us giving a penalty away and trying to do too much as individuals (there will always be arguments over NT squad selection). He seems to want to stick to his ideals of discipline and team play, and why not at the moment it is working, but needs to be careful that this doesn't cause squad stagnation and complacency.

Do you remember Varndell allowing the mighty Nick Evans to walk through him? Fofana is a lot more powerful than Evans.

Which isn't the same thing as saying don't drop Ashton.

I'd be calling for Wade anyway, but I think regardless, we have to give someone else a shot at wing.

Farrell had a very poor game IMO

Agree with Ashton needing to go, but Sharples should be next in line to come back