Kevin Sinfield thinks Steve Borthwick’s England should light up the north by playing a Test outside of London – and give rugby union a shot in the arm. And he has teased some early team news for the Red Roses’ next Six Nations outing next weekend.
England are currently training in York and are expecting up to 9,000 fans for an open training session just outside town on Friday as they prepare to meet Italy a week on Sunday.
The last Test they played in the north was a World Cup warm-up match against Italy in 2019, staged at Newcastle’s St James’ Park, which drew a crowd of 50,157.
England have also played at Old Trafford, in 1997 and 2009, but taking a match away from the newly sponsored Twickenham, which sells 82,000 tickets nearly every game would hit the RFU in the pocket.
But Sinfield, born in Lancashire but a legend in Yorkshire after over 500 games for league outfit the Leeds Rhinos, insists a game in the north would grow the sport in a message to the Rugby Football Union.
The England assistant coach said: “I know England football do it and I’d certainly be an advocate for it, to have a game somewhere up north would be fantastic.
“We’re representative of everybody across England, not just London. I get some of the counter arguments, why it’s important for us to be at the Allianz.
“But I also understand that if we want more boys and girls to pick up a ball across the country, we have to do a bit of this. We have to let kids in particular, see the role models and the players close up. Not everybody gets the opportunity to come down to London so it would be great.”
Marcus Smith is sure to be in demand from autograph hunters at Friday’s event and Sinfield revealed England will persevere with playing him at full-back.
It was Sinfield who floated the idea of switching Smith from 10 to 15 at the last World Cup and he has started England’s last two games, against France and Scotland, at the back.
Harlequins’ Smith has publicly stated he prefers playing at fly-half and reviews of his performances at full-back have been mixed – but Sinfield says the experiment is worth persevering with.
Sinfield added: “If we threw it in the bin now, it would be a wasted opportunity. If we can get him into a position where he is world class at both, it gives us so many different options. A second ball player is really important in the make up of the backline.
“Marcus’ big strengths are when he is in space. He is able to move laterally very, very quickly so he puts defenders under a lot of stress.
“It makes sense to try and get him a little bit wider where the gaps tend to be a bit bigger. It was never going to be an easy transition because he doesn’t play there for his club a lot.
“We have all seen the reports of how he loves playing 10, he is an outstanding 10 but he is a very, very good 15 as well. He’s a big running threat and has got a good kicking game.”
