Yahoo News England outcasts in contention for Lions call-up ahead of squad announcement
Several England players outside of Eddie Jones’s squad are in contention for a place on this summer’s Lions tour to South Africa, Telegraph Sport can reveal.
Marcus Smith, Danny Care, Ben Spencer and Sam Simmonds have all been included on head coach Warren Gatland’s long-list for Lions selection, with several other Premiership players also still under consideration.
Due to England’s disappointing fifth-place Six Nations finish, this summer’s tour had been widely anticipated to feature one of the smallest English contingents in Lions history, but those suspicions may have been misplaced.
Gatland, alongside his coaching team, are due to hold a final selection meeting on Wednesday afternoon at the Lensbury Club in South West London where they will discuss several players who have either been overlooked or discarded by England head coach Jones, before revealing their 36-man squad on Thursday.
Fly-half Smith, 22, has been in sensational form for Harlequins this season but remains uncapped internationally despite having previously been called up to England training squads and playing in a non-cap match against the Barbarians. If selected, the Harlequins playmaker would become the first uncapped player to be selected by Gatland for the Lions and would also become the first uncapped player to travel on a Lions tour since Telegraph Sport columnist Will Greenwood in 1997.
Considering the depth available to Gatland at fly-half, with the likes of Owen Farrell, George Ford, Dan Biggar, Finn Russell and Johnny Sexton all vying for selection in a squad that has been trimmed in size due to Covid, the selection of Smith would undoubtedly come as the biggest shock of Gatland’s esteemed Lions tenure.
At the other end of the age spectrum, 34-year-old Care, Smith’s half-back partner at Harlequins, has been the Premiership’s form scrum-half this season. He has not featured for England since winning the last of his 84 caps in a match against Japan in November 2018 when he is reported to have had a falling out with Jones.
Care’s partnership with Smith has embodied Harlequins’ upturn in form since the departure of head of rugby Paul Gustard in January, which has seen them develop into title challengers this season. Should the Lions wish to play a fast-paced game in order to keep the Springbok juggernauts on their toes, there would be no one better suited than Care – even if question marks do still surround his tactical kicking.
Despite only sitting in fourth place in the Premiership table, no team has come close to scoring the amount of points as Harlequins so far this season (516), with league leaders Bristol the next nearest (444); Smith and Care have been instrumental to their side’s full-throttle attack.
With England scrum-half Ben Youngs withdrawing from the tour for family reasons, Care now stands a strong chance of being included as a Lions bolter, in what would be his first tour. Spencer, another scrum-half out of favour at England level, also features; a reflection of the lack of depth available to Gatland in a key position.
Spencer has made four appearances for England, all as a replacement, with his last coming against South Africa in the 2019 World Cup final. The 28-year-old has thrived since moving to Bath from Saracens and offers one of the best box-kicking games in the northern hemisphere. Alongside Care, Exeter No 8 Sam Simmonds seems firmly in contention for a touring place. While Wales and Bath’s Taulupe Faletau is nailed on as the frontline No 8, the selection behind him is wide open. Gatland and his assistant coaches have attended a number of Exeter games in recent weeks and the Chiefs No 8, who has not added to his seven caps for England since 2018, offers a different skillset to the other contenders.
While 57 names were thrown up in the Lions’ first selection meeting, it is understood that other players have also come into the reckoning with the management needing options as injury cover.
Exeter wing Jack Nowell, Bath flanker Sam Underhill and Leicester fly-half Ford – despite the former pair having missed the Six Nations through injury – are among other regular England internationals to have been included on Gatland’s long-list, alongside the entirety of Saracens’ England contingent, including No 8 Billy Vunipola.
Optimism is growing at Twickenham, too, that both Jamie George of Saracens and Luke Cowan-Dickie of Exeter will form two-thirds of a trio of hookers in Gatland’s squad, most likely alongside Wales’ Ken Owens. Telegraph Sport revealed last month how England had launched an audacious bid to lure uncapped Sale hooker Ewan Ashman away from Scotland for this summer’s fixtures, suggesting that Jones and his coaching staff are resigned to losing their first-choice duo this summer.
Meanwhile two of Gatland’s favoured England players, centre Manu Tuilagi and lock Courtney Lawes, will not even have returned to action by the time the squad is announced on Thursday, as they remain sidelined with Achilles and chest trouble respectively. Unlike several of their Premiership colleagues, the duo will be relying on reputation alone at the Lensbury on Wednesday.
