Started England’s last international against the All Blacks a year ago,captain Lewis Moody and winger Mark Cueto only survive from the 15.
Moody, who has just recovered from an injury to lead the team out at Twickenham but the Bath flanker has dismissed worries about his match fitness.
He will skipper an England team that has five players making their Twickenham debuts on the international stage.
Chris Ashton, Ben Foden, Shontayne Hape, Courtney Laws and Ben Youngs are all being thrown in at the deep end, while prop Andrew Sheridan dons England colours against the new Tri-Nations champions after a 20-month injury nightmare.
Despite a surprise defeat to Australia in their final warm-up match ahead of their autumn tour in Hong Kong,All Blacks are still on a high and should readily work out a game plan to scupper England’s likely ploy to stifle their powerful backs.
Moody’s tussle with the equally resilient Richie McCaw should be one of the highlights of the clash but the tourists should have too much all-round strength for an England side still effectively displaying the ‘Under Construction’ banner.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment