The England head coach Stuart Lancaster, under heavy fire from all directions following the national team's embarrassingly early exit from their own World Cup, will not make a personal decision on his future for at least a fortnight and does not expect his employers at the Rugby Football Union to make any call of their own until the week of the final at the earliest. It means there is unlikely to be full clarity on the shape of the back-room team until next month.
“I think there is a lifespan to international coaching - to coaching any team, in fact,” Lancaster said when pressed on the level of his desire to continue in the role. “But that's not me stating a case one way or the other. I'll wait and see how I feel, and how the RFU feels, in the next couple of weeks.”
Lancaster was still hurting yesterday when he appeared in public to name his side for this weekend's “dead” match with Uruguay in Manchester - a team showing nine changes, one of them positional, from that which crumbled against Australia at Twickenham four days ago and effectively disappeared from the tournament as a consequence. “It feels just as bad now as it did then,” he said.
But his mood was less funereal than it had been in the immediate aftermath of the Wallaby defeat: indeed, he seemed unusually energised when speaking out in support of his captain, Chris Robshaw - another prime target for criticism over the last 72 hours or so. If England's players had defended their goal-line as aggressively as the coaches are defending individual members of the squad, they might now be among the favourites for the title.
Asked whether he had considered resting Robshaw from the Uruguay game instead of asking him to continue as leader, he replied: “Whoever was asking Chris questions a little earlier was lucky I didn't jump in and say: 'Hang on, why is he copping everything?' The implication is that he has not performed either as a player or a captain, and that somehow the whole thing has revolved around him. I don't understand the line of questioning, to be honest. We operated against a top-quality Australian team for 70 minutes rather than 80 and that wasn't good enough, but to put all of it on Chris is wrong.”
Robshaw is one of five members of a disappointingly fragile pack to hold their places for this weekend's valedictory fixture: the Saracens prop Mako Vunipola, the Wasps flanker James Haskell and the Harlequins No 8 Nick Easter are promoted. Lancaster has been far more brutal outside the scrum as Danny Care, Henry Slade, Jack Nowell and Alex Goode make their first appearances of the tournament.
George Ford, controversially benched for the crucial games with Wales and Australia, is back at outside-half, Owen Farrell shifting to the troublesome inside-centre position.
That means no place for the over-hyped rugby league refugee Sam Burgess, who does not even merit a place among the substitutes this time. If some bookmakers are to be believed, Burgess will soon be a union refugee seeking a new home in his old sport, but Lancaster claimed to have no knowledge of any such plans on the part of the most talked-about player in the land.
“That's today's news, is it?” he asked, with biting irony. “I genuinely didn't know that story was out there. My last conversation with Sam was about him going back to Bath and getting stuck into some Premiership rugby. He feels he's made strides as a union player, Bath will be delighted to have him back and I can't see anything changing.” – The Independent