Stuart Lancaster has insisted no firm decisions have been taken on the final make-up of England’s World Cup squad and denied that Sam Burgess is all but guaranteed to make his final 31 for the tournament. There have been suggestions the Bath player is already a shoo-in but Lancaster made it clear that such reports are inaccurate.
As he prepares to whittle down his wider squad to 36 players on Friday, the head coach emphasised he still had an open mind in certain positions, not least midfield where Burgess is among several candidates. “It’s incredible really, considering I was on holiday,” said Lancaster, referring to a report last week he had already finalised his team to face France at Twickenham on Saturday week.
“We didn’t even discuss selection until Sunday. We’ve come to recognise as a group that speculation always surrounds the England team. Sometimes it’s an educated guess, sometimes it’s widely inaccurate. It’s not ideal, but for the record, the first discussion we’ve had on selection was on Sunday.”
Lancaster also stressed he is “a long way from naming the 31” and said there are “still a lot of discussions to be had”. Either way, the chances of Danny Cipriani making this week’s cut have been bolstered by a further delay in the police investigation following the fly-half’s arrest on suspicion of drink-driving in June.
Cipriani has been rebailed until mid-November pending further inquiries, leaving him free to maintain his push for a World Cup place. In the absence of any charges, Lancaster says the player will be treated like any other member of the squad and said the delay was mere coincidence. “I was fully expecting him to go back to the police station on Monday,” said the head coach. “If so it was certainly nothing to do with me; I don’t have that power.”
Cipriani is now available to face France, with Lancaster indicating he did not intend to pick his strongest side until the game against Ireland at Twickenham on 5 September. “In the first game there are some areas where we will look at options but the majority of the side that will play in the first game are likely to be involved in the World Cup 31-man squad. There will be big changes going into the second France game and then we will go with what we consider to be our number one team for the Ireland game.”
