The England captain, Zoe Aldcroft, has been ruled out of the rest of the Rugby World Cup pool stage with a knee injury picked up in the Red Roses’ opening 69-7 win against the USA last Friday. England have two more pool matches, against Samoa on Saturday and Australia on 6 September.
Aldcroft is not England’s only worry as Emily Scarratt is out with a shoulder injury and Holly Aitchison is still sidelined with an ankle problem after missing the first game.
The England head coach, John Mitchell, said: “Holly’s got through a full week of training, so she’ll be available next week. We could have taken the chance on her this week, but we chose not to because we wanted to get her through full training. Scaz just had a little bit of a shoulder nerve problem. She was originally selected but we decided to protect her.” Marlie Packer will be captain against Samoa in one of 13 changes to England’s starting XV, starting at openside flanker.
It will be Packer’s first appearance of this World Cup, the fourth she has competed in. The 35-year-old said she and Meg Jones – who are vice-captains – have stepped up this week with Aldcroft out.
“We’ve just been there to support Zoe in whatever she needs, but she’s also been doing the same for us in training today,” Packer said. “Me, her and Meg caught up after the session for a couple of little bits on how we want to work as a group in how we want to be perceived. So actually, we’re just doing our roles as normal. We kind of look at each other [as] equal.”
Jess Breach retains her wing spot and is one try away from scoring her 50th for her country. Megan Jones is the other player who has kept her place but she will line up in a different centre partnership with Jade Shekells, who makes her Rugby World Cup debut, coming in for Tatyana Heard.
Emma Sing, who made an appearance from the bench last Friday, starts at full-back with Ellie Kildunne named as a replacement.
Maddie Feaunati is at No 8 and Abi Burton, who will also make her tournament debut, is named at blindside flanker. Lilli Ives Campion will also make her World Cup debut in the second row with Rosie Galligan starting at lock. Claudia Moloney-MacDonald and Helena Rowland, who were injured for the first game, start at wing and fly-half respectively.
Moloney-MacDonald said: “There’s huge competition in this team for every shirt. We have such depth in our squad which is a really good place to be in. It’s a long tournament. The main thing for this weekend is continuing that momentum we have created in the first round.”
England: Sing; Breach, Jones, Shekells, Moloney-MacDonald; Rowland, L Packer; Clifford, Atkin-Davies, Bern, Campion, Galligan, Burton, M Packer, Feaunati. Replacements: Campbell, Carson, Muir, Talling, Kabeya, Hunt, Harrison, Kildunne
