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Six Nations

Maro Itoje one of two changes for England for Calcutta Cup


Maro Itoje of England runs onto the pitch prior to the Guinness Six Nations 2026 match between England and Wales at Allianz Stadium on February 07, 2026 in London, England. (Photo by Dan Mullan - RFU/The RFU Collection via Getty Images)
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14 Comments

Captain Maro Itoje will return to the starting XV for England for their Calcutta Cup clash with Scotland on Saturday in round two of the Guinness Six Nations.

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The British and Irish Lions skipper was on the bench for the 48-7 victory over Wales in round one, receiving a yellow card within seconds of coming on as a substitute, but will come back into the starting line-up, with Alex Coles taking his place on the bench.

England’s stand-in captain against Wales, Jamie George, has, in turn, dropped down to the bench for the match at Murrayfield, with Luke Cowan-Dickie starting instead. Cowan-Dickie will reform the front-row which started the final match of the Quilter Nations Series against Argentina, alongside Ellis Genge and Joe Heyes.

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The only other change Steve Borthwick has made to his squad is on the bench, with Fin Smith replacing Marcus Smith as part of the 6-2 split.

England will head north looking for their first win in Edinburgh since 2020 and to retain the Calcutta Cup for the first time since 2017. They will take on a Scotland that will be desperate to respond to their 18-15 loss to Italy in round one in Rome.

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31 - 20
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England
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“Playing Scotland at Murrayfield is always a fantastic occasion and a challenge we are relishing,” said Borthwick.

“We made a pleasing start to the Championship, but we understand that we must continue to raise our standards. The squad has trained with focus and determination this week, and we’re excited for the opportunity to test ourselves again on Saturday.”

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England XV
15. Freddie Steward (Leicester Tigers, 42 caps)
14. Tom Roebuck (Sale Sharks, 9 caps)
13. Tommy Freeman (Northampton Saints, 23 caps)
12. Fraser Dingwall (Northampton Saints, 8 caps)
11. Henry Arundell (Bath Rugby, 12 caps)
10. George Ford (Sale Sharks, 106 caps) – vice-captain
9. Alex Mitchell (Northampton Saints, 28 caps)
1. Ellis Genge (Bristol Bears, 76 caps) – vice-captain
2. Luke Cowan-Dickie (Sale Sharks, 54 caps)
3. Joe Heyes (Leicester Tigers, 18 caps)
4. Maro Itoje (Saracens, 98 caps) – captain
5. Ollie Chessum (Leicester Tigers, 31 caps)
6. Guy Pepper (Bath Rugby, 8 caps)
7. Sam Underhill (Bath Rugby, 46 caps)
8. Ben Earl (Saracens, 47 caps)

Replacements
16. Jamie George (Saracens, 106 caps) – vice-captain
17. Bevan Rodd (Sale Sharks, 11 caps)
18. Trevor Davison (Northampton Saints, 4 caps)
19. Alex Coles (Northampton Saints, 15 caps)
20. Tom Curry (Sale Sharks, 66 caps)
21. Henry Pollock (Northampton Saints, 6 caps)
22. Ben Spencer (Bath Rugby, 15 caps)
23. Fin Smith (Northampton Saints, 13 caps)

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Comments

14 Comments
M
Mark 140 days ago

I fully realise that im committing heresy here, but im beginning to think that Itoji is now being picked on reputation and former glories.

Alex coles is currently and has been playing consistently better.

A
Alex 140 days ago

Just gonna ignore all the negativity below, and offer something (hopefully) constructive.


I think it's great that Borthwick wants consistency, and it makes sense to have a Northampton feel to the centres. However, if one of the centres gets injured, things could get proper messy for England. Fin Smith hasn't played much at centre. Would they shift Pollock there or something? Now that would be complacent! I really hope we don't see any injuries to our centres.

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Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

A Six Nations statistical deep dive suggests the European nations are no longer trailing their Rugby Championship counterparts.

33

Comments on RugbyPass

N
NoLongerARuck 5 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

I think hes done plenty of articles before about speed of game, ball in play time, pens etc in the Southern context and the North are now seemingly ahead in terms of key metrics that determine the quality of game especially those that World Rugby are after in terms of creating more value for fans

32 Go to comments
C
Conrad 6 minutes ago
Where's the power? And what to do with Sua'ali'i? The key questions facing the Wallabies

Plenty would say that. When he first came to Leinster the guy ended careers. Overnight.

32 Go to comments
N
NoLongerARuck 6 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

England were really awful on defence that game, were shellshocked half way through it

32 Go to comments
C
Conrad 8 minutes ago
Where's the power? And what to do with Sua'ali'i? The key questions facing the Wallabies

Toner was treated terribly. Nobody would call him world class but he had to have been one of the most improved players as test level for a period. He was the only reason the 2016 SA tour was even close. Awful treatment in the end.

Henshaw has spoken about being the 24th man early on and accompanying the sqaud on tours. Schmidt would still expect non-playing sqaud memebrs to be able to talk him through all the set plays when he asked them. If you couldn't, it was never overlooked.



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G
GrahamVF 8 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

In all fairness the ref backed off giving penalties and after the pack had marched the Irish pack backwards on the double for ten meters then folded he tol the Bok scrummie “Play it.”

The psychological advantage of being so comprehensively dismantled in the scrums is huge. You can fix missed tackles and sloppy attack - even fix high ball skills - but it’s far more difficult to fix an entire scrum when they are that comprehensively beaten. And that’s what Rassie’s aim was - not necessarily scoreboard dominance but to send the message if you want to play on the same field as us you had better fix your scrum. Like I said - not so easily done.



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32 Go to comments
N
NoLongerARuck 10 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

How do you judge the North South battle and if the North is catching the South? I think theres a couple of categories to consider. In the early 2000’s the South was ahead on almost every category that determines the quality of rugby playing region. I would say the categories are:

Coaching



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32 Go to comments
G
GrahamVF 14 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

“Having opened it up coincided with a massive uplift in the success of the Springboks.” That and the development of black and Coloured players. A huge previously untapped resource to the Springboks.

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G
GrahamVF 16 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

“The North arguably offers more in terms of entertainment than the South at club level as well. The Prem, the Champs Cup, URC and Top 14 all feature plenty of scoring and different playing styles while Super Rugby seems to be the same thing game in game out. While the South tries to speed up the game artificially with new trials and law variations the North has shown you can do it with good refereeing which penalises cynical play harshly and encourages positive actions on the field.”

Great para and sums it up perfectly. In SA we were sooooo tired of the endless 26 phase going nowhere or backwards cycles of Super Rugby the URC came as a breath of fresh air. We were back to the various elements that make rugby stand out from league. Scrum, ruck, lineout, maul - variety fGs



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32 Go to comments
N
NoLongerARuck 24 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

The Six Nations produced so many compelling games and so much of action packed moments that you can only conclude that its the best international comp out there at the moment except for a world cup. If Wales improve it will be even better especially given the strides Italy have made in recent times. The Rugby Championship is now taking a hiatus in a year it really should be building toward something better which is terrible considering the competition was so tight last year. The Nations Champs promises much but one gets the feeling that the 6 Nations teams will not be at their peak given its at the end of their long season. In terms of rugby quality and entertainment Id rather watch the 6 Nations over everything else other than a world cup right now. The North arguably offers more in terms of entertainment than the South at club level as well. The Prem, the Champs Cup, URC and Top 14 all feature plenty of scoring and different playing styles while Super Rugby seems to be the same thing game in game out. While the South tries to speed up the game artificially with new trials and law variations the North has shown you can do it with good refereeing which penalises cynical play harshly and encourages positive actions on the field. In terms of entertainment the North wins. In terms of winning? They are making strides but until they win another world cup or get a team to rank number 1 again for an extended time again they cant really say they are better than the South.

32 Go to comments
C
Conrad 24 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

Agree. In the end, they had to resort to starting off the ball stuff at 77 mins to rattle Ireland and run the clock as it was only a two score game - which is insane given their dominance.

I suspect Rassie may have gone hard on them afterwards.



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32 Go to comments
C
Conrad 27 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

Agree. Tournament play or a knockout game I’m sure they would be nailing their kicks instead.

Even conservatively, they left 12-15 PTS behind which is strange as they should have been worth double that by getting their opponents down to 12 players.



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32 Go to comments
C
Conrad 30 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

It’s noticeable that most NH test teams now refuse to kick for goal until maybe the 3rd or 4th time of asking across the same phases of play. It’s such a trend that they have to be coached that way now.

I think the amended rules around playing the 9 - or not being able to - have helped things as the teams seem to prefer kicking 50/50 constables or going multi-phase in the opponents 22. The 6N teams generally have tempo 9’s that are hitting 70+ rucks a match, so it suits them.



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32 Go to comments
C
Conrad 38 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

I view it that way also. In most cases advantage for the home teams across both July/Nov legs. The Boks are obviously the exception and poor old Fiji never seem to get to to play at home.

The NH teams rarely went into these July windows having to pick full strength to lock horns with 3 Tier one’s on the bounce.



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32 Go to comments
D
DC 40 minutes ago
Why the Wallabies-Ireland rematch won't look anything like last time

Ireland should win handily. Even if they are subpar these days - and with an incompetent 10 in Wonderboy. SH rugby is poor ‘and always has to rely on the incompetent refs to even be worthy oppo.

7 Go to comments
C
Conrad 41 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

Exactly right Mzi! If LSL is in that squad I think it’s a long old evening for us.

I don’t really see us going 6 in a row so I do think a fast starting WB’s take this one.



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32 Go to comments
C
Conrad 44 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

Very in-depth!!!

Some of the stats are very interesting. Still not sure how Ireland putting 42 PTS on england without a scrum can be explained!



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32 Go to comments
N
NoLongerARuck 44 minutes ago
Nations Championship: 'The data shows the north has finally caught up with the south'

South Africa sometimes get carried away when the going is good. They lost to Australia that way and they should have won by way more against Ireland but they were more interested in battering and brutalising their opponents than being clinical.

32 Go to comments
T
Tom 1 hour ago
Losing to Henry Pollock would be unbearable

Absolutely. England are unlikely to out-Bok the Boks. I say only unlikely because they did nearly do it in the 2023 world cup which was a hell of a performance by the forwards (until Dan Cole got benched).

If England go into the game and try to win an armwrestle I'm gonna be p*ssed off. The Boks are a fantastic side but they have shown occasional frailty when sides take them out of their comfort zone. If England play into their hands, they lose.



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R
RT 1 hour ago
Losing to Henry Pollock would be unbearable

As an Englishman i fear the worst for Saturday , very tough afternoon in store .

12 Go to comments
L
Lou Cifer 1 hour ago
Losing to Henry Pollock would be unbearable

One feels there is too much media pressure to, at a bare minimum, include him in the matchday 23. A hype-monster has been created & some days it’ll work in England’s favour and some days it won’t. Only time will tell which outweighs the other….

12 Go to comments
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