ENGLAND TO GO FULL THROTTLE
Youngs: Team will fly with fans back at Twickenham
BEN YOUNGS says a first full house at Twickenham for 20 months will transform Six Nations flops England.
Eddie Jones names his team today to face Tonga, promising to refresh both the line-up and brand of rugby in the wake of England’s worst ever championship.
A major difference from the spring will be an 82,000 sellout crowd replacing the empty arenas in which the team bombed against Scotland,Wales and Ireland.
Youngs, England’s senior player with 109 caps, said, “Rugby is a game built on emotion.The forwards go toe to toe and do things that normal people don’t do, trying to bash the hell out of each other.
“To do that you need emotion and when you’ve got 80,000 screaming, it’s a pretty good way to get adrenaline and arousal levels going.”
Youngs insists forwards such as Ellis Genge, Kyle Sinckler, Courtney Lawes and Maro
Itoje “feed” off big-match atmospheres – fuelling them to “fly” into tackles and rucks.
“It’s incredibly different when you have nothing other than the staff and the finishers on the bench shouting,” he said. “Having our fans back is a huge advantage.”
Jones, right, wisely refuses to assume the return of a crowd will automatically flick a switch and take England back to their 2019 best. The head coach said: “Fans give you courage at times, they give you stamina and excitement at times and sometimes a team needs that little bit extra.
“As we became an older team, the influence of the crowd became greater and we probably missed not having them more than anyone.
“But we have a different challenge now. A lot of the younger guys haven’t played in front of crowds and now they go to Twickenham, which is the biggest rugby crowd in the world.
“They will have to get used to the expectation that the fans bring of wanting us to play well. We need to make sure they are so glad to be back at Twickenham.” Jones was at Murrayfield last week to scout Tonga and saw a depleted Scotland win 60-14.
He witnessed the crowd disengage with half an hour of the game still to play and has a warning for his players. “Our target is to make sure our fans don’t do Mexican waves,” he said. “That we play such good quality rugby they haven’t got time to do that.”