Sharks provide great eight for England

EIGHT Sale Sharks players have been called up to England U20s training squad for the first development camp of the 2018/19 season.

Forwards Nic Dolly and Bevan Rodd will be joined by backs Connor Doherty, Luke James, Cam Redpath, Arron Reed, Gus Warr and Kieran Wilkinson.

The camp starts at Loughborough University today and runs until Sunday. It will give coaches an opportunity to assess players further ahead of U20 Elite Player Squad (EPS) selection in January 2019. The group includes 15 players capped at U20 level last season.

“The development camp gives us an opportunity to cover some basic details with a larger number of players who could all be required at various points during the Six Nations,” said head coach Steve Bates. “It also gives us a chance to look closely at the wider group and players outside of the 32-man EPS who might be used during the international season.”

Three more Sale Academy players have invited to join their national team’s training squads.

Back-rower Ciaran Booth (Ireland), prop Ewan Ashman (Scotland) and lock Rouban Birch (Wales) will all be involved with their countries’ forthcoming U19 squad programmes.

Sale Sharks’ academy manager Brendan Thomas said: “In the past couple of seasons, we’ve provided more players to England’s age grade squads than any other club. These additional international selections are further evidence of the progress of the academy.” Meanwhile, four players who are under-18 have committed their futures to Sale. They are scrum-half Raffi Quirke, fly-half Tom Curtis, wing Tom Roebuck and prop James Harper.