Sam Underhill suffers another setback on road to recovery

Bath boss Stuart Hooper has responded to reports that Underhill, who has suffered four concussions in eight months, isn't being looked after properly by the club.

"The thing you get with Sam is he is a high profile player and people make assumptions which are pretty dangerous. He is in a GRTP (graduated return to play) process which is being hindered at the moment by Covid," revealed Hooper to

“That will continue and the great thing is that process is now individual and the experts that we use and people we will see will make a programme for him. It is not a blanket that you have to do this or that. It is the week-long process that everyone has to be clear on and beyond that it is very individual. 

“As soon as we get Sam out of isolation then we can get to see a specialist and make sure he has the right plan. What is really important is the facts in this kind of situation and people write and talk about these things based on what they know from their position. 

“We are working with Sam and dealing with it. He is a tremendous rugby player and committed defender who has had a couple of head knocks. It is being handled in a way we believe is the right and safest possible way and you will see that he is excited about getting back to playing. 

“He simply hasn’t seen the specialist and with head knocks and player welfare being a hot topic, when he is out of isolation we will have a plan.”

A knee injury prevented Hartley from travelling to Japan for the 2019 World Cup and effectively ended his England career.

The phone call he received from Eddie Jones was brutal, Hartley revealed.

"You're f***ed mate," Jones told Hartley, despite the hooker's plea for a chance to prove his fitness.

"Even by the standards of the 6am texts he delivers while running on the treadmill, which make the recipient’s balls tighten and the brain melt, this phone call was brutal," writes Hartley in his book.

"He was effectively ending my England career with three words."

Kiwi-born England hooker Dylan Hartley recalled Yarde arriving at England’s Pennyhill base, “a bit bruised and battered” after a club game.

“Eddie greeted him with a bright ‘How are you feeling, mate?’ and the conversation quickly went downhill. ‘Oh, a bit tired.’ ‘F… off, mate.’ ‘What?’ ‘If you’re tired, f… off. I don’t want tired players here.’ As you can imagine, their cosy fireside chat echoed around the halls within minutes.”

He never played for England again.

Former England start Kyran Bracken was the first person to reveal why the Quins playmaker was mysteriously frozen out of Jones plans in 2018 despite being a regular up until that point.

“He (Care) made the mistake of speaking his mind to Eddie Jones and questioning how he wanted him to play when he was playing with an England ‘B’ team against Japan in the autumn of 2018,” revealed the former England scrum-half.

“Eddie’s response to that was ‘that’s not the f***ing attitude I want’ and he binned him from his plans.”

This story was later backed up by England and Harlequins teammate Mike Brown in his column for the Mail Online with Care confirming he's been blacklisted

DID YOU KNOW? At age 11 he was invited to join the Academy at Sheffield Wednesday Football Club which meant giving up club rugby union for a few years

Brown revealed in his column recently: ‘I’d had one of my best seasons for Quins (2018/19) with really good attacking stats (2019), but Eddie had pigeon-holed me as a defensive full-back. At the end of this meeting, he asked if I had anything I wanted to say.

“I challenged his comments that I was just a defensive full-back, saying I thought I had been adding value to the attack, with examples and stats from my season, before saying I would take away all of his points and that I would do everything I could to get into the World Cup squad.

“He did not like that I had contested what he said and went mad. He shouted: ‘Well you lost the f****** ball in contact on Saturday, didn’t you? That’s f****** not good enough. You’re not f****** doing everything you can.'”

Ultimately, Brown wouldn’t be picked for the Rugby World Cup with Jones saying that his clash with teammate Ben Te’o had nothing to do with his omission. He’s not been picked since.

DID YOU KNOW? He married long term partner, fashion designer Eliza Scarlett Woodcock, the daughter of former England international footballer Tony Woodcock in 2016