Maro Itoje facts: Five things you didn’t know…

The 27-year-old Saracens forward features on a four-strong shortlist announced by World Rugby alongside France scrum-half Antoine Dupont, Australia captain Michael Hooper and his Wallabies colleague Samu Kerevi.

Itoje, who won his 50th England cap in Saturday's victory over Australia at Twickenham, was nominated for the prestigious award in 2016 and 2017, when it was won on each occasion by New Zealander Beauden Barrett.

Here are five things you might not know about the England and Saracens powerhouse.

His full name is much more of a mouthful. The lock was born Oghenemaro Miles Itoje in Camden, London on 28 October 1994 to Nigerian parents.

As a schoolboy, Itoje played several sports including basketball, football, rugby and athletics, representing England at U17 level in shot put.

Maro got a rugby scholarship to London Harrow school when he was 11. He then studied for a Politics degree at the School of Oriental and African Studies in Bloomsbury, London at the same time as starting his rugby career.

The current England star writes poetry in his free time and tried his hand at modelling too. Maro starred alongside Amelia Windsor, cousin of Prince Harry, on a sports luxe-themed Tatler shoot for their October 2018 issue. Rumours in the press followed that the pair had begun dating, but this was never confirmed or denied by the second-row.

He is the cousin of Bath's loosehead prop Beno Obano. Gloucester speedster Ollie Thorley is also Itoje’s cousin, after his grandfather re-married a Nigerian woman who is the Saracens lock’s aunt.