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England U20 coaching staff for 2018/19 announced

By Alex Shaw
James Scaysbrook of Exeter in action during the Heineken Cup match between Exeter Chiefs and Glasgow Warriors at Sandy Park. (Photo by Scott Heavey/Getty Images)

The RFU have announced a new three-man coaching team for the U20s for the 2018/19 season, with Mark Hopley, James Scaysbrook and Richard Whiffin joining the set-up.

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The trio will come on board as part of the coach development programme agreed between the RFU and Premiership Rugby in 2016. Previous graduates of the program include Louis Deacon, Tom Williams and Ian Vass in the first year of the program, as well as Anthony Allen, Richard Blaze and James Ponton last season.

The coaching staff will be assisted by pathway performance coaches Steve Bates and Jim Mallinder, whilst they will also continue their current club duties for the duration of their tenure with England.

Hopley, who was appointed academy head coach at Northampton Saints earlier this year after working as defence coach with the seniors, Scaysbrook, the forwards and defence coach at Toyota Shuttles in Japan, and Whiffin, the head of academy at Gloucester and former backs coach at London Irish, make up the most experienced group England have had yet under the new coaching development agreement.

All three are held in high regard in coaching circles, with Hopley’s hire as Northampton’s academy head coach considered a coup given his work in previous years, whilst Whiffin masterminded Gloucester’s run to the final of the U18 Premiership last season, putting up plenty of points and shredding opposition defences in the process.

Mark Hopley, (R) the Northampton Saints academy head coach talks to forwards coach Phil Dowson during the Northampton Saints training session. (Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)

The trio will have a good pool of players to work with this year, which includes the likes of Marcus Smith, Marcus Street and Joel Kpoku, all of whom return for another year of eligibility if not required by the senior side, as well as fresh faces like Ollie Lawrence, Alex Coles and Will Capon, who are set to make the step up in their first season as professionals.

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Hopley, Scaysbrook and Whiffin will lead the group in the U20 Six Nations next year, before taking the team to the World Rugby U20 Championship, which will be hosted by Argentina next summer.

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Jon 8 hours ago
Jake White: Are modern rugby players actually better?

This is the problem with conservative mindsets and phycology, and homogenous sports, everybody wants to be the same, use the i-win template. Athlete wise everyone has to have muscles and work at the gym to make themselves more likely to hold on that one tackle. Do those players even wonder if they are now more likely to be tackled by that player as a result of there “work”? Really though, too many questions, Jake. Is it better Jake? Yes, because you still have that rugby of ole that you talk about. Is it at the highest International level anymore? No, but you go to your club or checkout your representative side and still engage with that ‘beautiful game’. Could you also have a bit of that at the top if coaches encouraged there team to play and incentivized players like Damian McKenzie and Ange Capuozzo? Of course we could. Sadly Rugby doesn’t, or didn’t, really know what direction to go when professionalism came. Things like the state of northern pitches didn’t help. Over the last two or three decades I feel like I’ve been fortunate to have all that Jake wants. There was International quality Super Rugby to adore, then the next level below I could watch club mates, pulling 9 to 5s, take on the countries best in representative rugby. Rugby played with flair and not too much riding on the consequences. It was beautiful. That largely still exists today, but with the world of rugby not quite getting things right, the picture is now being painted in NZ that that level of rugby is not required in the “pathway” to Super Rugby or All Black rugby. You might wonder if NZR is right and the pathway shouldn’t include the ‘amateur’, but let me tell you, even though the NPC might be made up of people still having to pull 9-5s, we know these people still have dreams to get out of that, and aren’t likely to give them. They will be lost. That will put a real strain on the concept of whether “visceral thrill, derring-do and joyful abandon” type rugby will remain under the professional level here in NZ. I think at some point that can be eroded as well. If only wanting the best athlete’s at the top level wasn’t enough to lose that, shutting off the next group, or level, or rugby players from easy access to express and showcase themselves certainly will. That all comes back around to the same question of professionalism in rugby and whether it got things right, and rugby is better now. Maybe the answer is turning into a “no”?

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j
john 11 hours ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

But here in Australia we were told Penney was another gun kiwi coach, for the Tahs…….and yet again it turned out the kiwi coach was completely useless. Another con job on Australian rugby. As was Robbie Deans, as was Dave Rennie. Both coaches dumped from NZ and promoted to Australia as our saviour. And the Tahs lap them up knowing they are second rate and knowing that under pressure when their short comings are exposed in Australia as well, that they will fall in below the largest most powerful province and choose second rate Tah players to save their jobs. As they do and exactly as Joe Schmidt will do. Gauranteed. Schmidt was dumped by NZ too. That’s why he went overseas. That why kiwi coaches take jobs in Australia, to try and prove they are not as bad as NZ thought they were. Then when they get found out they try and ingratiate themselves to NZ again by dragging Australian teams down with ridiculous selections and game plans. NZ rugby’s biggest problem is that it can’t yet transition from MCaw Cheatism. They just don’t know how to try and win on your merits. It is still always a contest to see how much cheating you can get away with. Without a cheating genius like McCaw, they are struggling. This I think is why my wise old mate in NZ thinks Robertson will struggle. The Crusaders are the nursery of McCaw Cheatism. Sean Fitzpatrick was probably the father of it. Robertson doesn’t know anything else but other countries have worked it out.

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FEATURE Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby? Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?
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