Eddie Jones should play Hughes and Vunipola together
DAI YOUNG has urged Eddie Jones to unleash the dynamic ball-carrying duo of Billy Vunipola and Nathan Hughes on England’s autumn international opponents at Twickenham.
Vunipola, 23, has put in a barn-storming performances for the European and Premiership champions this season while Hughes, who qualified for England in June, has been battling to get starts in the competitive Wasps back row.
England head coach Jones has made the right selection calls and won a Grand Slam and achieved a 3-0 series whitewash of Australia as he has gone nine games unbeaten this year.
Hughes, 6ft 5in and 19st, is now in the EPS group for the first time and Jones will name his initial 45man squad for the autumn tests on September 30, with 32 of those players heading to Brighton for training camp on October 2-4.
The two No.8s appear to fulfil the same ball carrying role, but Hughes has considerable ground to make up on Vunipola and has yet to appear on the international stage.
However, Young, the Wasps director of rugby, believes playing 25-year-old Hughes at No.8 and Vunipola, below, 6ft 2in and 20st, at blindside flanker would give England two outstanding attacking weapons when they take on South Africa, Argentina, Fiji and Australia in the autumn tests.
Young told The Rugby Paper: “The opportunity to see Billy and Nathan playing together for England is a mouth-watering one and no one would look forward to playing against those two players.
“Billy was similar to Nathan when he was at Wasps, but is now unrecognisable having developed his game.
“Nathan is a little bit behind Billy but they are going to be a handful for anyone. There are not many better ball carriers than Nathan in world rugby. There are parts of his game that need improvement and fair play to Nathan, he has put in a lot of work having recognised what needs to be done. “He has to increase his work rate outside the 25 ball carries a game he does and in Test rugby you need to be putting in 15 tackles and hitting 20 rucks.
“Nathan has improved his fitness out of sight and if he wants to play at the highest level that had to be done. He cannot afford to make those ball carries and then drift out of a game for 10 or 15 minutes.
“His fitness level is unrecognisable from where it was and his defensive capabilities have improved. He is a vastly better player and is much nearer an international player than he was 18 months ago.
“And I’m a massive fan of Billy and he was with us at Wasps and we were very sorry to see him go.”