Ford handed an England recall after Farrell injury

GEORGE FORD has been recalled by England to fill the void left by Owen Farrell’s injury setback — and will join up with the national squad for their training camp in Brighton this week. The 28-year-old Leicester fly-half has been widely heralded as the form No10 in the country this season, but he was not picked by Eddie Jones for the autumn Tests at Twickenham and the head coach omitted him last week when he named 36 players to prepare for the Six Nations. While there was no place for Ford, uncapped Bath rookie Orlando Bailey was included, along with Marcus Smith — England’s primary playmaker during the successful November campaign. However, there has been a dramatic twist, following the news that Red Rose captain Farrell has suffered a training-ground injury at Saracens. With the Test centurion in danger of missing the entire championship after apparently damaging his right ankle, Ford has been handed a chance to revive his international career. Sportsmail understands that the 77-cap veteran has been summoned to the camp in Brighton and his return is due to be officially confirmed by the RFU today. England also need to name a stand-in captain and Courtney Lawes is expected to fulfil that role, as he did so impressively during autumn victories over Tonga and South Africa.

While Ford’s presence will create competition for Smith, the Harlequins prodigy remains destined to wear the England No10 shirt for the Six Nations opener against Scotland at BT Murrayfield on February 5. Jones had named Farrell as his skipper for the whole tournament and was keen to resurrect the plan for him to join forces with Smith again in a 10-12 alliance, but that vision has been disrupted by an untimely and apparently innocuous incident. Farrell was on course to make his comeback for Saracens yesterday against London Irish in the European Challenge Cup, having been out of action since mid-November following surgery on his left ankle. Unfortunately for the 30-year-old — as revealed by Sportsmail on Saturday — a collision in training has now resulted in an injury to his other ankle. Explaining the situation yesterday, Saracens’ director of rugby, Mark McCall, said: ‘It’s not the original injury which was on his left leg. It’s his right ankle unfortunately, so he’s going to see a specialist in the early part of the week and that will determine how long he’s going to be out for. ‘I don’t think he’s going to be available for the Scotland game (on February 5). ‘It happened right at the end of the training session and it was a really accidental thing. He stood on someone’s foot and went over on his ankle. We’ll wait and see what the specialist says and see if he can play some part in the Six Nations.’