u/justicenowater — reddlx

England not going with two squads for Nations Championship

Two articles stating that Borthwick will not be splitting up the squad (to leave a team back in England to play Fiji as some thought might happen) for the Nations Championship.

Arguably having a separate squad for the Fijimatch was an opportunity to expose a bunch of new players to test rugby. Will be interesting to see how the players handle the extreme travel over three matches.

https://www.rugbypass.com/news/courtney-lawes-prem-performances-to-be-monitored-as-he-targets-england-comeback/

“Three matches in three weeks on three continents is…quite a challenge,” said Borthwick, who will not be splitting his squad at any stage of the tour.

https://inews.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/england-squad-ollie-lawrence-benhard-janse-van-rensburg-4423638

It is understood that all 36 will make the challenging trip to Johannesburg, back to the UK and then out to Argentina for a Test match there, although a handful may be rested for the middle clash with Fiji.

u/justicenowater — 3 days ago

▲ 22 r/rugbyunion

Brain injury legal action faces threat of collapse

The lawyers representing the players have not been fulfilling their obligations to disclose all relevant medical records to the defence.

A hearing, likely to be staged at the end of July, will decide whether a deadline to gather and share information will be extended once more, or if players who joined the legal action before April 2025 and lack full paperwork will be struck off.

https://www.bbc.com/sport/rugby-union/articles/cp3p4p769v2o

u/justicenowater — 4 days ago

▲ 14 r/CanadaRugby

Canada and Zimbabwe - Nations Cup Approaches.

Canada men play Zimbabwe on July 18, 2026 as part of the Nations Cup. Currently Canada are ranked 25th and Zimbabwe 24th.

In February of this year Zimbabwe had a probables v possibles (they were called Red and Green respectively) match.

Then in March Zimbabwe sent an A side to play matches against a regional South African side and a South African club side.

In April Zimbabwe played two tests against Zambia.

Today Zimbabwe announced a squad set to do a training camp against the Blue Bulls from South Africa.

In June Zimbabwe play South Africa A, and apparently have a multi day training camp with SA U20s.

Also in June, and in really quite a brilliant bit of imaginative scheduling in direct prep for the Nations Cup, Zimbabwe have set up a test against Mexico in Mexico on the 27th.

Meanwhile, what have Rugby Canada been doing? At the very least I hope they are keeping a close eye on the upcoming BC v Ontario series.

Why is there not a Canada USA prep match, or a probables v possibles match set up, or both?

Why do Zimbabwe see Mexico as a worthy opponent but Canada has never (I stand to be corrected on this) played them despite being such a close neighbour? Sending an A side to play Mexico would be a cost effective way to give some lower ranked Canadian players meaningful test like experience.

Zimbabwe simply cannot have a budget much bigger than Canada. Yet they are showing how it should be done to set up meaningful exposure for their players.

reddit.com

u/justicenowater — 4 days ago