England's Games hopes lie with Gollings
Thu, 15 Jul 2010 15:44
England will have all their top Sevens stars available for the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi, with the bulk of the IRB Sevens World Series squad all called up into the initial training squad.
The experienced group features 13 players who featured for England in this season's IRB competition, including world record points scorer Ben Gollings, who is the sole survivor from Melbourne 2006 when England were silver medallists.
The only uncapped player is Miles Mantella, the 18-year-old Harlequins back who led Millfield to National Schools Sevens titles in 2009 and 2010.
Head coach Ben Ryan will work with additional players before the final team is nominated in September and England then go to New Delhi where the Sevens event takes place on October 11 and 12. They face Australia, Namibia and Sri Lanka in the pool stages.
"We've got experience, we've got youth and we have the expertise of taking part in big competitions. It gives us the backbone you need to bring through some exciting young players," Ryan said.
"It [the extended time together] will also have a great impact on our conditioning. Sevens players are specialised athletes and our aim is to be fitter, faster and in better shape than we've ever been.
"We've made great strides in applying new technology to what we're doing and we work in partnership with bodies like UK Sport to make sure we are pushing back the boundaries in terms of our physical, technical and tactical preparation.
"There will big guns in New Delhi like New Zealand, who have won three gold medals since Sevens was introduced to the Games in Kuala Lumpur in 1998, which means we're certainly not going to be the favourites.
"But we believe and trust in the players selected and that our preparation will be right going to Delhi so that we'll be in the best possible shape when we're on the start line."
England Sevens squad: Greg Barden, Kevin Barrett, John Brake, Dan Caprice, Alex Cheesman, Chris Cracknell, Isoa Damudamu, Ben Gollings, Simon Hunt, Ollie Lindsay-Hague, Miles Mantella, Dan Norton, Tom Powell, James Rodwell, Nick Royle, Mathew Turner, Christian Wade.
Commonwealth Games Rugby Sevens, October 11-12
Pool A: New Zealand, Scotland, Canada, Guyana
Pool B: South Africa, Wales, Tonga, India
Pool C: Samoa, Kenya, Uganda, Papua New Guinea
Pool D: England, Australia, Namibia, Sri Lanka
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