England Drops Steve Borthwick

Steve Borthwick has been axed from England Elite Player Squad

After 57 caps and a 20-game run as skipper under Martin Johnson, Steve Borthwick has been dropped from the England Elite Player Squad for the 2010-2011 season. As predicted by your correspondent, Lewis Moody takes on the captains role.

Four 2nd rows are in the squad, so Borthwick is now ranked below Courtney Lawes, Tom Palmer, Simon Shaw and David Attwood and he now moves down into the England Saxons squad.

England team manager Martin Johnson said “Leaving Steve Borthwick out was a hard decision. He’s done a fantastic job for England over the last couple of years and it’s the most difficult call we’ve had to make. It is very tough on Steve but it goes to show the depth of talent we’ve got in that area”.

The full Elite Player Squad for 2010-11 is:

Forwards:
David Attwood (Gloucester Rugby), George Chuter (Leicester Tigers), Dan Cole (Leicester Tigers), Tom Croft (Leicester Tigers), Paul Doran-Jones (Gloucester Rugby), Nick Easter (Harlequins), Hendre Fourie (Leeds Carnegie), Dylan Hartley (Northampton Saints), James Haskell (Stade Francais), Courtney Lawes (Northampton Saints), Lewis Moody (Bath Rugby), Tom Palmer (Stade Francais), Tim Payne (London Wasps), Simon Shaw (London Wasps), Andrew Sheridan (Sale Sharks), Steve Thompson (Leeds Carnegie), David Wilson (Bath Rugby), Joe Worsley (London Wasps)

Backs:
Delon Armitage (London Irish), Chris Ashton (Northampton Saints), Matt Banahan (Bath Rugby), Danny Care (Harlequins), Mark Cueto (Sale Sharks), Toby Flood (Leicester Tigers), Riki Flutey (London Wasps), Ben Foden (Northampton Saints), Shontayne Hape (Bath Rugby), David Strettle (Saracens), Mike Tindall (Gloucester Rugby), Dominic Waldouck (London Wasps), Jonny Wilkinson (RC Toulon), Ben Youngs (Leicester Tigers)

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 1st, 2010 at 17:11 and is filed under Rugby Union and tagged with 2nd row, andrew tobin, andy tobin, axed, captain, dropped, Elite Player Squad, England, Lewis Moody, lock, rugby, second row, SLIK images, Steve Borthwick. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.