'He's not a dick with it': Why Tom Curry is set to skipper England
So excited are Sale about the likely prospect that Tom Curry will skipper England in this Saturday’s Guinness Six Nations opener that they have brought forward their bus journey to London by two hours so that they will be in their team hotel in plenty of time to see their friend lead out his country at Murrayfield.
With regular skipper Owen Farrell ruled out of the entire tournament and his anticipated successor Courtney Lawes not quite right this week due to a concussion, the next man up to lead appears to be Curry, one of the three vice-captains Eddie Jones has in his squad along with Ellis Genge and Luke Cowan-Dickie.
Curry was sat alongside Jones at last week’s Six Nations launch in the absence of Farrell and Lawes, an appointment that indicated he was in pole position to be the England captain when they take on Scotland in the eagerly awaited Calcutta Cup match.
It won’t be until 11:30am on Thursday when Jones officially confirms that Curry is his preferred team leader for the round one Six Nations opener, but Sale reckon the England coach will have chosen well if the 23-year-old with 36 caps his country and three more with the 2021 Lions is announced as skipper for the game in Edinburgh.
“It’s huge, innit,” enthused Sale boss Alex Sanderson when asked what it would mean for the club to see one of its players appointed England captain for the 2022 championship opener. “It’s huge for Tom. Because he is our mate and part of the fabric of this club it is therefore important for everyone. He has grown into that role and he seems to be relishing it – if he does get the captaincy.
“We are going down two hours early on the bus (to London on Saturday ahead of Sunday’s game at Harlequins) so we can get into the hotel and watch him take the field. It would have been nice if we had a couple more (players involved) but we are very much looking forward to seeing how it goes if that happens. It’s huge, huge for the club. I guess it’s another feather to our cap in terms of our evolution.”
It was January last year when Sanderson was appointed the Sale director of rugby. At that time he wouldn’t have predicted Curry would be the England captain 13 months later, but the club coach now describes the back-rower’s imminent promotion to the Test skipper role as somewhat of a natural progression.
“You can’t predict. You really can’t know the minds of men, and then there is knowing the mind of Eddie Jones. But Tom came back off the Lions and there was all talk about his leadership ability and quality, so that was in the air then with his return to us but we just wanted him to focus on his game.
“He is 23 and with the mastery of the game that he has got, one of those things is, ‘Well, how can he get better?’ Well, of course, he can get better in his reading of the game, attacking ability, you can maybe maximise his physiology to be faster and fitter but this is one area, the leadership, where you can make strides as you get more experienced so it was a natural progression for him.
“There are loads of different ways of leading. Tom is someone whose standards off the field inspire others to be better as well. When people look at the diligence, how diligent he is with regards to his recovery – recovery is a big one these days because that gives you the ability to go again, how he talks in meetings. What I am saying is, he is very much a leader of the game and this is where he is growing.
“He is affable, a nice fella, a really good lad. I like him a lot, I’d have a beer with him. But you get people who are like the social gel, people who just understand and are able to push other people’s buttons whereas Tom is a little bit different to that. Tom is and has been so driven over so many years, he lives the epitome of what it is to be a very high performing, elite athlete and he is not a dick with it, he is more than open to share.
“Like he sits down with Sam Dugdale, who came on at the weekend, and he will go through all his clips, all Sam’s clips because he has got a real passion for the game, he wants Sam to get better as well but he pushes people through his own standards to be better players. He is probably more suited to an international environment I’d say than he would be to a club environment where that level of intensity that he has can burn people out occasionally.
“I have seen it happen but not Tom because the depths and levels of his energy are fathomless. So that is his biggest attribute. When he does come back in, just the intensity and the level of training raises. That is one man having an influence on 40 people around him.”
Comments on RugbyPass
Ever so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
1 Go to commentsChristian Lio -Willies 2 try perfomance was a standout. As was captain Scott Barrett. Up front was where the boys won it.They are a great team and players. Fantastic Crusades , you can keep going.
1 Go to commentsI don't know how the locals feel about that? I guess if you call yourselves the Worcester Wasps that might be appease. But really we need more teams in the Premiership in my view so they are not padding it out as they are at the moment. It might curtail so many players going abroad as well
5 Go to commentsNZ 😭😭😭is certainly rivaling England for best whingers cup!😭😭😭 !!!
24 Go to commentsYup. New Zealand won 3 out of 10 world cups played. SA 4 out of 8 attempts 30 Vs 50 per cent.🤔🤔
24 Go to commentsShould've done this years ago. Change Saturday kick off times to around 11am. Up and off and back home before 3pm, limit travel time too. Allows players to actually do something else with their Saturday that's family oriented or being rugby fans they could ‘watch’ pro rugby. Increases crowds etc. How can anyone that enjoys grassroots and pro rugby have to choose between the two on Saturdays?
9 Go to commentsI bet he inspired those supporters just as much.
1 Go to commentsBen Smith Springboks living rent free in his head 😊😂
67 Go to commentsGood to hear he would like to play the game at the highest level, I hadn’t been to sure how much of a motivator that was before now. Sadly he’s probably chosen the rugby club to go to. Try not to worry about all the input about how you should play rugby Joey and just try to emulate what you do on the league field and have fun. You’ll limit your game too much (well not really because he’s a standard athlete like SBW and he’ll still have enough) if you’re trying to make sure you can recycle the ball back etc. On the other hard, you can totally just try and recycle by looking to offload any and everywhere if you’re going to ground 😋
1 Go to commentsThis just proves that theres always a stat and a metric to use to justify your abilities and your success. Ben did it last week by creating an imaginary competition and now you did the same to counter his argument and espouse a new yardstick for success. Why not just use the current one and lets say the Boks have won 4 world cups making them the most successful world cup team. Outside of the world cup the All Blacks are the most successful team winning countless rugby championships and dominating the rankings with high win percentages. Over the last 4 years statistically the Irish are the best having the highest win rate and also having positive records against every tier 1 side. The most successful Northern team in the game has been England with a world cup title and the most six nations titles in history. The AB’s are the most dominant team in history with the highest win rate and 3 world cups. Lets not try to reinvent the wheel. Just be honest about the actual stats and what each team has been good at doing and that will be enough to define their level of success.
24 Go to commentsHow is 7’s played there? I’m surprised 10 or 11 man rugby hasn’t taken off. 7 just doesn’t fit the 15s dynamics (rules n field etc) but these other versions do.
9 Go to commentsPick Swinton at your peril A liability just like JWH from the Roosters Skelton ??? went missing at RWC
14 Go to commentsLike tennis, who have a ranking system, and I believe rugby too, just measure over each period preceding a world cup event who was the longest number one and that would be it. In tennis the number one player frequently is not the grand slam winner. I love and adore the All Blacks since the days of Ian Kirkpatrick when I was a kid in SA. And still do because they are the masters of running rugby and are gentleman on and off the field - in general. And in my opinion they have been the majority of the time the best rugby team in the world.
24 Go to commentsHaving overseas possessions in 2024 is absurd. These Frenchies should have to give the New Caledonians their freedom.
21 Go to commentsBell injured his foot didn’t he? Bring Tupou in he’ll deliver when it counts. Agree mostly but I would switch in the Reds number 8 Harry Wilson for Swinton and move Rob Valentini to 6 instead. Wilson is a clever player who reads the play, you can’t outmuscle the AB’s and Springboks, if you have any chance it’s by playing clever. Same goes for Paisami, he’s a little guy who doesn’t really trouble the likes of De Allende and Jordie Barrett. I’d rather play Carter Gordon at 12 and put Michael Lynagh’s boy at 10. That way you get a BMT type goalkicker at 10 and a playmaker at 12. Anyways, just my two cents as a Bok supporter.
14 Go to commentsThanks Brett, love your articles which are alway pertinent. It’s a difficult topic trying to have a panel adjudicating consistently penalties for red card issues. Many of the mitigating reasons raised are judged subjectively, hence the different outcomes. How to take away subjective opinions?
9 Go to commentsYes Sir! Surprising, just like Fraser would also have escaped sanction if he was a few inches lower, even if it was by accident that he missed! Has there really been talk about those sanctions or is this just sensational journalism? I stopped reading, so might have missed any notations.
9 Go to commentsAI is only as good as the information put in, the nuances of the sport, what you see out the corner of the eye, how you sum up in a split second the situation, yes the AI is a tool but will not help win games, more likely contribute to a loss, Rugby Players are not robots, all AI can do if offer a solution not the solution. AI will effect many sports, help train better golfers etc.
45 Go to commentsIt couldn’t have been Ryan Crotty. He wasn’t selected in either World Cup side - they chose Money Bill instead. And Money Bill only cared about himself, and that manager he had, not the team.
28 Go to comments