The England fly-half Owen Farrell is finally ready to start his first competitive game of the season when Saracens begin the defence of their European title in Toulon on Saturday. Barring any late recurrence of the back problems that have sidelined him since early August, Saracens expect their ace goalkicker to be available for the first time since England’s triumphant tour to Australia in June.
Club and country will be suitably relieved, with Saracens’ director of rugby, Mark McCall, describing Farrell on Wednesday as “the best player in Europe”. The club have prospered in their No10’s absence, with Alex Lozowski making a highly favourable impression, but a heavy-duty contest down on the Cote d’Azur against a hugely experienced Toulon side is made for someone of Farrell’s warrior instincts.
Assuming Farrell suffers no reaction to training this week he will go straight into the starting XV, with McCall admitting it is “hugely tempting” to pick the 25-year-old, despite his lack of match practice. “Owen is world-class, the best player in Europe in my opinion,” McCall said. “He has been training regularly over the last three weeks and he is a big game player, so there are lots of things in his favour to pick him. There are players who can come straight back and Owen is one of them.
“He is one of the fittest guys I have ever seen, so that doesn’t come into it. It obviously makes it hugely tempting for us to start him if he is OK. He didn’t react well after last Wednesday’s session but he’s much more in contention this week. He’s been all good with his kicking and he’s done some tackling as well, so hopefully he’ll be available. It’s quite a big shout.”
Saracens are also waiting on the fitness of the full-back Alex Goode, who has a knee problem, but apart from the suspended Chris Ashton and the injured Duncan Taylor they boast largely the same personnel who helped win them the domestic and European double last season. Reports that the South Africa second‑row Eben Etzebeth would be arriving on a short‑term deal as a replacement for the recently retired Alistair Hargreaves seem to have been exaggerated, with McCall all but ruling out the possibility.
“We’ve been exploring a couple of options and Etzebeth was one of them but that looks like it won’t happen,” McCall said. “Signing him would have solved a problem until the end of January but after that we’d have had to find a different solution. It’s very hard to find someone who is good enough, who is available to get into this country and who is also out of contract.”
Saracens also happen to have a number of other top-quality locks, including Maro Itoje, who McCall reckons could easily slot into the back row for England this autumn. With James Haskell, Sam Jones, Mike Williams and Sam Underhill all unavailable, the head coach, Eddie Jones, is looking at Itoje as a back-row option and McCall sees no problems whatsoever. “He is a very destructive player and I think he would do a great job,” McCall said. “He gets as many turnovers as anybody in the Premiership.”
Itoje is more concerned with the looming challenge of Toulon but said he will be happy to play wherever Jones asks him. “I’ve been switching positions for a while now. It’s not like asking a winger to play prop. I’ve played back-row, I’ve played second-row. It’s something I’m fairly used to. To be honest, I’ll play wherever the coach tells me to play.”
McCall is due to attend a meeting of directors of rugby at Heathrow on Thursday to which Jones has been invited, but a number of his fellow head coaches will not be joining him. In such a busy European week it is understood that Leicester’s Richard Cockerill, Northampton’s Jim Mallinder and Sale’s Steve Diamond are among those who will not be present, with Harlequins’ director of rugby, John Kingston, having already sat down with Jones on Wednesday. As with England’s training session in Brighton last week, the scheduling of this prearranged get-together is less than ideal, with McCall still irked by the timing of the Brighton camp.
McCall is hoping all sides can come to a more satisfactory arrangement in future. “It’s up to Eddie what happens in the camp because that’s what is in the agreement. We can’t blame England for everything. They’re entitled to do what they think is right in these camps. [But] it’ll be good to have a face-to-face meeting. It doesn’t have to be a fight. We’ve had very good cooperation with England and Eddie so far and, despite the fact I was misquoted a few times last week, I don’t see that changing.
“My issue was with the timing of the first camp. No one else seems particularly bothered but that doesn’t make me wrong. My point was people who make those decisions really don’t understand performance needs. They could have asked a few directors of rugby whether they thought it was OK to have the camp 10 days before Europe. Had I been asked I’d have said we’d prefer it to be on a different day. That’s all.”
