Sopoaga earns Wasps recall after 9-game absence
Rugby Reporter LYON-BOUND Lima Sopoaga returns to Wasps’ squad after missing their last nine games to face Exeter Chiefs in today’s Gallagher Premiership clash (12.30pm).
The former All Blacks international’s rumoured switch to the Top 14 was confirmed in midweek and, having been named among the replacements at Sandy Park, is set to make his first appearance for Wasps since the home loss to Harlequins in January.
Jimmy Gopperth’s run of featuring in every Wasps game this season comes to the end as the 37-year-old misses out. Jacob Umaga starts at fly-half with Michael Le Bourgeois selected at inside centre.
James Gaskell and
Matteo Minozzi have picked up knocks preventing their participation, with Ben
Morris and Rob Miller stepping in at blindside flanker and full-back.
Tom West starts and Alfie Barbeary are among the replacements, both having missed out against Clermont Auvergne a fortnight ago, and another absentee from that agonising Heineken Champions Cup defeat, Jeff Toomaga-allen also returns to the bench, which also includes Levi Douglas, Sam Wolstenholme, Zach Kibirige, Ben Harris and Gabriel Oghre.
Head coach Lee Blackett explained what the key motivation is for Wasps with the season now reaching its business end and the club sitting nine points off the top six, which secures a return to Heineken Champions Cup action next season.
He said: “We have seven games left and one thing we have spoken about this week, is not so much about
position, it’s more about, some people are leaving at the end of this season, players, and we’ve been through a lot.
“We’ve been through a tough lockdown period together, we’ve been through all the emotion of getting to the final, we’ve gone through some lows recently.
“I want the people that are leaving to have some really good memories at the end and it’s about making memories in these last seven games and giving it everything so we’re sending people off on a high.
“That’s been our emotion.
“We’ve got seven games left. If you average it out, we’ve got three, four training sessions a week, so we’re talking we don’t even have that many sessions, 28 if you do four a week, to give absolutely everything in every session and game, and make sure those who are leaving the club, that we care a lot about, that we send them off on a high.”
For Exeter, Jack Nowell is set for his first appearance of the season after undergoing toe ligament surgery last year. England wing
Nowell, who has not played since October, is named on Exeter’s bench, while Rob Baxter makes four changes in giving starts to wing Facundo Cordero, props Alec Hepburn and Harry Williams, plus lock Sam Skinner.
WASPS: Miller; Odogwu, Fekitoa, Le Bourgeois, Bassett; Umaga, Robson; West, Taylor, Brookes, Launchbury (c), Rowlands, Morris, Young, Shields. Replacements: Oghre, Harris, Toomagaallen, Douglas, Barbeary, Wolstenholme, Sopoaga, Kibirige.