Middleton’s second string given chance to make case
England women will show eight changes from the side who routed Wales 63-0 for this afternoon’s home match with Italy at the Stoop.
Lydia Thompson and Danielle Waterman, the joint top try-scorers in the women’s Six Nations so far, are rested with Saracens’ Sarah McKenna selected at full-back and Richmond’s Kay Wilson winning her 40th cap on the wing.
Alex Matthews returns from injury, while Rachael Burford, Justine Lucas, Vicky Fleetwood, Emily Scott and La Toya Mason all start, with the latter pair forming a new half-back partnership. Amy Cokayne, Rochelle Clark, Izzy NoelSmith and Katy Mclean drop to the bench.
Rochelle Clark, who is named among the replacements, is looking to win her 120th cap, while captain Sarah Hunter will go joint fourth on the list of all-time Test appearances for England with her 88th cap.
“We are working to improve continually through the competition and that is our aim,” head coach Simon Middleton said. “Saturday will provide players who have trained hard week in, week out, with an opportunity to show what they have to offer on the pitch. We must respect Italy as a side and that is reflected by the depth of our preparation for Saturday’s game.”
England’s other victory in this year’s tournament came against France, while Italy have lost both their matches. England beat Italy 33-24 in Ivrea last year.
Embarrassing, incapable, unexpected, demoralising, inexplicable. Those were some of the kinder words used by the Italian press to describe their country’s 63-10 defeat by Ireland two weeks ago. It would be easy to label that as a low point, but Italian rugby has been in the doldrums for so long that one humiliation quickly blends into another.
In their past five Six Nations matches, Italy have conceded an average of more than 50 points. In the Pro12, Treviso and Zebre’s combined record against overseas opposition reads two wins from 26 games. Another heavy defeat for the Azzurri against England tomorrow would embolden calls for Georgia to be granted admission to the Six Nations at their expense. One Italian journalist has already argued that they no longer deserve their place at Europe’s top table.
Reasons for hope, then, are thin on the ground, particularly as England boast a 100 per cent record against Italy. Yet in Conor O’Shea, Italy have a coach whose relentless optimism would have led General Custer to think things were looking up at Little Bighorn.
O’Shea is the third coach that Luke McLean, who starts at inside centre tomorrow, has played under after Nick Mallett and Jacques Brunel. Whereas the others placed an emphasis on stylistic or structural issues, O’Shea’s primary focus has been on restoring that long forgotten virtue of self-belief.
“The main thing I noticed with Conor is that he is really, really positive,” McLean said. “You can tell that he gets frustrated with some of the things that we are doing, but all in all, he really believes in us and that’s important. We have come off a few years where results have not gone our way and a certain amount of doubt has crept in. He is really big