'He's a kid out of school and it can be daunting Naiyaravoro sprinting flat out at you'
Wasps boss Lee Blackett may be frustrated by his team’s general inability to convert pressure into points in the Gallagher Premiership, but he is liking what he has recently seen from 19-year-old Charlie Atkinson who will be promoted to a senior team contract for next season after making his first-team breakthrough via the academy.
Atkinson hit the headlines last September when his second appearance off of the Premiership bench lasted just minutes as he was mowed down by a red-carded high shot at Saracens from England skipper Owen Farrell.
He has since bounced back to make a dozen Premiership appearances in this 2020/21 season featuring a half-dozen starts. The first four starts during the winter months were initially at out-half but Atkinson has since popped up at full-back, wearing the No15 jersey in the last two Wasps league outings against Worcester and Northampton.
His stats on the Premiership Rugby website from those last two games highlight how busy Atkinson has been, making 143 metres from 23 carries that featured five clean breaks and left five defenders beaten. They were also two tackles and on the negative side of the ledger, there were three tackles missed and three turnovers conceded.
Blackett openly admitted when quizzed by RugbyPass that he still very much viewed Atkinson as an out-half but the importance in recent games was more to get his youngster on the pitch in whatever position possible to help further accelerate his development.
The teenager made headlines last September when Owen Farrell collided with him with a high shot https://t.co/L7rJouRTth
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) May 25, 2021
“What you will find with a lot of 10s now is they will spend a lot of time in the backfield,” explained Blackett when asked for his assessment on how Atkinson has fared as the starting Wasps full-back. “10 and 15 are our two full-backs at times so it is not as big a change as people make out for a 10 to go and stand at full-back because defensively that is where he normally is.
“What I have seen is it gives us a big right foot, left foot combination with him and Jacob (Umaga) and the reason we have probably not played him at 10 is the form of Jacob recently, he has been going really well and we are trying to bed Charlie in.
“There has been bravery, putting his body on the line. He had to make a few last-ditch tackles at the weekend on players like (Taqele) Naiyaravoro. He is a kid just out of school and it can be daunting with a figure like Naiyaravoro sprinting on the wing flat out at you at full-back and he is putting his body on the line.
“There is plenty of little parts of his game in terms of the game management he has done well, but I still think there are little parts of his game that are going to come on. His positioning, he is definitely a 10. He is a 10 that can play 15 rather than a 15 that can play at 10 but for us it is about trying to give him game time and trying to get him out there, making him better for this experience and speeding up his development.”
Atkinson’s height and weight aren’t officially known. His profile in the Wasps match programme from the last home game versus Worcester was blank while his profile on the club website is currently absent, but Blackett is happy with the level of robustness that the player who turns 20 in October is demonstrating.
“He is a good size, Charlie, works hard in the gym. For a 19-year-old kid, our academy has done a great job on him. He has had a specialist S&C coach going into school every week with him, he has had one-to-one Wasps coaches, S&C coaches going in and looking after him.
“Our younger guys that we are thinking ‘he’s a definite 100 per cent Premiership player’, we send specialist coaches in so every week at school he would have had an S&C coach going into him, a rugby coach going in and seeing him working on his skill set just to get him to this place.
“Fair play to those staff, they have accelerated his development and it’s very rare that you get a kid come through this quickly that spends most of his time on the field. You’ll find that guys that come in this quickly sometimes pick up knocks and Charlie is pretty resilient in that way, but he has had a lot of attention put on him for quite a while.”
"I've had conversations with the referee a couple of times. I spoke to Spreaders as well… I was really frustrated after the game"
– Lee Blackett has revisited post-game comments and also addressed the Gloucester-Bath cancellation that has hurt Wasps https://t.co/gwuXC3T02x
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) June 1, 2021
Comments on RugbyPass
Crazy he’s only 28, feel like he’s been around forever - don’t mind the move, safe pair of hands and creates depth in a thin position for ABs. Hopefully aides Kemara’s growth also without thrusting too much responsibility on him
1 Go to commentsMen should show strength and be mean, but they should be able to show emotion to those close yo them in certain times, birth of your child, death of family, proud moment. This article is stupid
4 Go to commentsWhat a weak article…absolute drivel and clickbait, well done. Will stick to rugby365 thanks
4 Go to commentsHonest, discipline, humility… Priceless.
2 Go to commentsSo many excuses. No mention of the SA number 2 being taken out illegally in the 2nd minute. That act of foul play had a massive impact on the SA game. Face it, NZ play pretty dirty very regularly, and it’s only since 2016 they’ve been held to higher officiating standards via stricter officiating and TMO reviews. They deserved to have a man down. Sorry. Fix the yellow and red cards and NZ will win more RWCs. Plus, there WAS a knock on invalidating the one try, so it was NOT a try. Period. Here’s a Kleenex…
212 Go to commentsOverheard conversation between NZ and SA rugby fans everywhere: We’re the greatest! No! we’re the greatest! We’re the greatest! No we’re the greatest! Ireland are arrogant! True but they beat you! We’re the greatest! No! we’re the greatest! Etc. etc, etc.
23 Go to commentsTypical crap Aussie weather
11 Go to comments“If they’d have beaten England, I still feel we would have been talking ‘is this the best team ever,’ ‘is this the best team that’s ever played in the Six Nations'” he said. “I still think they’re not quite that good. I actually don’t think they’re that good.” So Trimble is saying he doesn’t think this is the best 6N team of all time. He is silent on if it is the best Irish team of all time. Can’t disagree with him. Just another misrepresentative clickbait headline from the guys at RP.
23 Go to commentsWow, do we really still have to listen to all the excuses and “unfairness” of it all. Even blaming the bounce of an egg shaped ball for the loss. But the article is about context, so what about the Springboks having to play the other 5 teams in the top 6 and still beating a comparatively rested AB team on a very empty tank.
212 Go to comments“Teams would generally have three coaches below their head honcho; attack coach, defence coach, forwards coach” do they? I’m not sure what the NZ set up is tbh, but the other 4 sides top 5 sides all have very different structures to the one outlined in the article! As well as attack, defence, and forwards coaches, SA, Ireland, and France also have specialist scrum coaches. England have a specialist scrum coach too, but arguably don’t have a forwards coach, with that role taken on by Borthwick. SA also have a backs coach in addition to defence and attack, and Ireland and England have fitness coaches, with England also having two skills coaches.
2 Go to commentsWorst article I've read in a while. Trying to disguise a backhand slap as a compliment. The whole article is a bit weird and negative. I think South African men are emotional in general… think Clad le Clos’s father 2012 London Olympics.
4 Go to commentsIreland are going to win the world cup.
23 Go to commentsIt was the strangest result ever. Etzebeth should've been yellow card for his cynical retiring move and a penalty try. Birth second half tries by the Allblacks were fantastic and the TMO operating outside the law to rule out the first try was egregious. Yes, the boks got the win but it was through some bizarre officiating that allowed them to sneak home against 14 men that dominated them. The quieter Bok supporters know and acknowledge the Allblacks were the better and dominant side. Justifying the win because they beat a pre world cup Allblacks selection is silly.
212 Go to commentsA very English thing to do hey Courtney, blerrie kant
4 Go to commentsIt sounds like Andrew is trying to convince himself or has just lost all perspective. The team did look jaded for the last couple of games of the six nations but a few things were wrong there. Italy tackled their hearts out and made Ireland work hard for every try. Outsmarted by Scotland? Huh? Ireland got held up over the line about 4 times. Scotland did nothing on attack the whole game other than one breakaway near the end. A recharge and reset is needed which they hopefully will have had before the SA your.
23 Go to commentsIncluding SA and Argie teams was great for the quality of rugby, but middle of the night games and player travel/ jet lag make that unworkable. I think that SA in Europe and Argie building an American league with USA, Canada etc would be better long term. If Oz can't sustain Rebels then next cab off the rank should be a Japanese team. Keep regional comps to time zones, both club and test rugby. Then existing test windows for test tours plus RWC.
8 Go to commentsMisogynists have feelings too!
4 Go to commentsCrowd sizes of the URC v the Premiership must be a big factor.
1 Go to commentsWell you’ve made a proper tit of yourself, haven’t you! 😂
173 Go to commentsBen it's beyond their comprehension-
212 Go to comments