Ollie Lawrence and Elliot Daly have both lost their central contracts, with Steve Borthwick omitting the pair from his 25-man squad a year before England’s World Cup campaign begins.
Neither Lawrence nor Daly – who was nursing an arm injury – featured in the three Nations Championship matches this summer but both were prominent during the Six Nations and are the standout exclusions of Borthwick’s selections which point towards his thinking for the World Cup squad next year.
The Northampton forward Alex Coles and the Sale prop Asher Opoku-Fordjour – who can play both sides of the scrum – are among the eye-catching inclusions while Borthwick has opted against handing a contract to the South African-born centre Benhard Janse van Rensburg, who made his debut over the summer. Courtney Lawes, who is available again after a move to Sale from France and has made clear his intentions to go to the World Cup, is also overlooked.
In total, Borthwick has made five changes to the group of players who receive around £150,000 a season and over whom the head coach has greater control. Joining Coles and Opoku-Fordjour in receiving a contract having missed out a year ago are Seb Atkinson, Guy Pepper and Jack van Poortvliet. Omitted along with Lawrence and Daly are the injury-plagued Ben Curry, his Sale teammate Tom Roebuck and Tom Willis, who has moved to Bordeaux.
Atkinson’s inclusion goes some way to explaining Lawrence’s exclusion but it is still a surprise given the Bath centre starred in England’s autumn victory against the All Blacks last year. He and Fraser Dingwall – who also impressed against New Zealand – have fallen down the pecking order since then, however.
Daly’s omission is also out of the blue given Borthwick values his versatility and just last November tipped the 33-year-old to play an important role for England at the World Cup next year. His exclusion does not rule him out of contention for the tournament in Australia, for which a larger squad of 33 will be selected, but demonstrates where he is in Borthwick’s thinking with the Nations Championship matches in November.
Coles’s inclusion, meanwhile, is no surprise given he played in all 12 England Tests over the past year and started the summer matches against South Africa, Fiji and Argentina with the captain, Maro Itoje, rested. Opoku-Fordjour has only eight caps to date but his versatility sets him apart, while Atkinson has emerged as Borthwick’s first-choice inside-centre.
Borthwick made headlines when he chose to select Van Rensburg at the first possible opportunity over the summer after he qualified for England on residency grounds, but he has not been deemed worthy of a central contract. Handing Lawes a contract after a two-year sojourn in France could have sent the wrong message to players based in England but the 37-year-old will surely get his chance to stake a claim in the coming season. The same goes for Joe Marchant, who has also joined Sale.
Ben Curry’s omission is unsurprising given his injury problems, while Roebuck’s standing has fallen quickly, but Borthwick has not selected a like-for-like replacement for either the Sale wing or Daly, demonstrating how fluid his back-three options are. Willis’s move to France, confirmed weeks after he was given a central contract, was embarrassing for the Rugby Football Union and Pepper is the beneficiary, while Van Poortvliet started all three summer Tests with Alex Mitchell injured.
