As the U20 Six Nations rolls on, promising young players continue to shine when the top opportunities come calling. After earning his first call-up in South Africa, for last years’ U20 World Championship, Northampton Saints hooker Craig Wright has nailed his name to the number two jersey for Mark Mapletoft and Andy Titterrell’s side.
Wright has started at hooker for England’s three consecutive victories, as the age-group players eye up a Grand Slam. Following the same schedule as the senior men’s side, the U20s have recorded wins against Italy, Wales and Scotland, and comfortably sit at the top of the table. A trio of bonus point wins puts England a point ahead of Ireland, with the two sides set to clash in the Triple Crown decider at Bath’s Recreation Ground on Friday March 8th.
Wright is getting ready to head to the home of Bath Rugby, which was also the long standing residency of England U20 scrum coach Nathan Catt. Wright talked about how Catt has been a brilliant asset for the Player Pathway, since the former West Country front rower joined up with the side last November. Speaking in a recent England U20s media event, Wright said;
“Nathan is really good, obviously he’s got lots of experience what with playing with Bath and England himself. Lots of detail, and brings lots of energy around the scrum, and you can see his passion for it. It rubs off you, I’m extremely passionate about what we do in the scrum, I think that showed against Wales. It’s really good to work with him, he gives you lots of stuff to work on and lots of detail.”
So far during the 2024 U20 Six Nations, Wright has been propped up by Bath loose-head Billy Sela and Sale’s highly talked about tight-head Asher Opoku-Fordjour. The trio have formed an imposing front-row, and Wright is relishing in having two powerful pillars either side of him every time they pack down for the crouch, bind and set. Speaking on the success that they find as a front row collective, Wright added;
“Yeah they are definitly two big, strong boys. It makes my job easier, they’re just absolute… I think strength-wise, brilliant. Like I said earlier the relationships with each other, I think working alongside Asher and working alongside Billy, we are all constantly feeding back to each other on what we can improve on. Just really trying to help lift each other, on how we can scrum at our best, and I put that down into our performances like we did.”
In a similar fettle to the seven selected Saints in the England senior squad, there is a strong Northampton contingent in the U20s squad. Wright, along with scrum-half Archie McParland, fullback Toby Cousins and back-row starlet Henry Pollock, have all emerged as mainstays in the England Pathway system for the 2024 Championships. Wright called the green, black and yellow core to the England U20s, a ‘brotherhood’ and is delighted to see his club teammates progress alongside him.
“It’s good with all the lads. We’ve built such a relationship here, it is such a good brotherhood. We get along with everyone here, everyone just merges together, it’s quite a good environment to be honest with all of us here.”
“Again, it’s just kind of been really easy, he’s (Archie McParland) is a good player. I’ve played with him before, thought he played really well (against Wales), and we knew that when we play together in the starting XV. He’s a good player, he just does what he needs to do, he’s awesome.”
Leading the side is an anomaly of the squad, as England U20 captain Finn Carnduff is often the sole representative of Leicester Tigers. Taking over from former England U20 skipper and Tigers teammate Lewis Chessum, Carnduff has had a flying start to his time at the helm, with a perfect trio of performances across both the back-row and in at lock. The Northampton hooker was full of praise for his all-inspiring England captain.
“He’s been doing really well. Fortunate to go through the system with Finn, he’s someone I’ve always seen as quite a natural leader. Really get along well with him, he’s got the authoritive figure about him and he’s really good like that. People know what he is saying, he is a good person to follow.”
In line with Steve Borthwick’s squad, the England U20s will also enjoy their second fallow week this week, with no game scheduled for the weekend. After the win against Wales, Wright went back to Northampton, and made a replacement appearence in their exhibition defeat to Bedford Blues last week. Speaking on the challenges in keeping up to match readiness amidst the busy schedule, Wright discussed how he can get some well earned down time in between fixtures.
“It’s been good, so a lot of us were quite fortunate to get a little bit of rest time, just to fully recuperate and to try to stay in the flow of the game. And just kind of relax before going into these intense environments. So, a lot of the lads would do normal training, it just depends on (match) minutes, and how you’re body feels really.”