For the England head coach Eddie Jones big has always been beautiful and he stuck to that maxim by picking a colossal three-quarter line for Saturday’s Six Nations clash with Italy.
Ben Te’o and Manu Tuilagi have been picked as a heavyweight centre partnership coming in at combined weight of 34-and-a-half stone. On the wing Bath’s Joe Cokanasiga adds another 18-and-a-half stone to the mix with Jonny May the comparative lightweight at 14-and-a-half stones.
Henry Slade is on the bench, with Owen Farrell loading the bullets for the big guns at 10, and Tuilagi shifts to 13 as Jones attempts to bulldoze the Italians.
Jones has always liked a good big ‘un ahead of a good little ’un and this has the whiff of the team Jones has always wanted to pick but injuries have meant he has not been able. Back in the day the Australian picked big wingers such as Wendell Sailor and Lote Tuqiri when he was in charge of the Wallabies but neither of them were the dimensions of Cokanasiga.
Jones cited a game in 2016 when the England three-quarter line of Marland Yarde, Jonathan Joseph, Owen Farrell and May were more than 9kg a man lighter than their Wallaby opposing numbers. Now as soon as he had the chance Jones has supersized.
The Teo/Tuilagi combination was seen for six minutes in 37-18 win over Australia in November and Jones has been itching to get them together. Tuilagi is inching his way back to top form after a groin injury whilst Worcester’s Te’o suffered a side strain in January to add to a catalogue of other strains and stresses.
The pair will be expected to punch holes in the Italian defence if the visitors slow the ball at the breakdown and cause general mayhem in midfield.
“In certain games it’s massively important, when maybe you’re not getting fast ruck ball and the only way to get through the line is by smashing through it,” said Jones. “At times you need to have a team that can play like that. Certain referees will give you faster ruck ball and certain teams will give you faster ruck ball but other teams won’t, so when the game is tight you need a bigger back line.
“They're both very good players. Manu is really starting to come back to where he can be. In training Jonny May went to go around him and Manu rounded him up. I haven't seen that sort of acceleration from Manu for a long time. He's starting to get back to his best and maybe playing one space further out will help him.”
Conor O’Shea, the Italian head coach, took a look at the England line-up, before saying: “This is probably the team that Eddie has wanted to pick for quite a while. Certainly in the back line it is the one he is probably dreaming of. Teo and Tuilagi are two magnificent rugby players. They’re big and powerful in defence and attack. He’s eluded to it enough that it’s a team he;s wanted to marry up for quite some time. If you put the two of them together, there’s only one choice at 10. Joe on the wing is another big powerful man. It’s a big powerful team.”
It won’t get any easier up front were Jones has picked two potentially explosive props in Harlequins’ Kyle Sinckler and Leicester’s Ellis Genge. Sinckler’s short fuse has already been highlighted by Warren Gatland in the lead-up to the Welsh game but Jones has backed the pair to keep calm.
“There’s that great book written by Dr Steve Peters – The Chimp Paradox – and we don’t want to take the chimp out of them,” added Jones. “We want them to be aggressive, tough, relentless props but at the same time be able to understand the discipline of playing for your team and playing against a team and playing with the referee.
“For those really naturally aggressive players it’s always a challenge but as you play more games at the top level, your team-mates understand you better, they understand their team-mates better and they learn to channel it in a very productive way. Hopefully we will see more of that on Saturday. They won’t be the finished product on Saturday but hopefully we’ll be another step closer.”
