Spotlight on Kyle Sinckler

Harlequins are a tough team to evaluate this year, with their contrasting home and away form, but one area where they have definitely made a significant stride forward is at the scrum.

Much of this improvement is a direct result of the development of young tighthead Kyle Sinckler.

The 23-year-old has always been a highly-touted prospect, not least so because he was part of England’s successful 2012 and 2013 U20 classes, but he is now beginning to fully realise that potential.

Sinckler’s age-grade teammates Jack Clifford, Luke Cowan-Dickie, Elliot Daly, Ollie Devoto, George Ford, Matt Kvesic, Jack Nowell, Henry Slade, Billy Vunipola, Anthony Watson and Marland Yarde have all gone on to win senior international caps since graduating from the U20s and it would not be surprising if the tighthead joins them in the near future.

His performances so far in the 2016-17 season have been of a very high standard and though Quins have struggled for consistency as a whole, he has been a reliable producer at the set-piece and in the loose.

In fact, it’s at the set-piece where his progress has been most noticeable.

Coming out of the U20s, Sinckler was quickly thrust into senior club action, partly due to his potential but also due to Quins’ issues at tighthead, and there were certainly growing pains. Several experienced looseheads in the Aviva Premiership went after Sinckler early in his career, when the youngster was too upright in the scrum and still learning his trade.

Fast-forward three years, however, and those growing pains are quickly being forgotten as Sinckler turns himself – under the tutelage of Adam Jones and Graham Rowntree – into one of the more formidable scrummaging tightheads in the competition.

He has spent the last year training alongside Jones, soaking up knowledge and picking up the tricks of the trade from the venerable Welshman and that development got another injection of impetuous this year when Quins brought in former England scrum coach, Rowntree.

Rowntree, to many, unfortunately seems to have be tarred by the inefficiency of England’s scrum at the 2015 Rugby World Cup, with fans quick to forget that England had one of the most successful scrums in the world for most of his eight-year tenure. For any club to have a man of his experience can only be described as a coup.

If you watch Sinckler scrummage now, he looks worlds apart from the 20-year-old who took the first tentative strides of Harlequins career three years ago, when he was still reliant on the power he had used to dominate at U20 level.

Now, his feet are firmly planted beneath him and he sinks his hips, getting his back and body as low as possible. More often than not this season, he has been able to get himself lower than the looseheads he has faced and he has enjoyed success as a result.

Throw his work as a carrier and, believe it or not, a first receiver into the mix and Sinckler is pushing hard for Test recognition.

He has previously represented an England XV against the Barbarians and was part of the squad which toured Australia this summer, but he is yet to make his international bow in a capped game.

Dan Cole is well-entrenched as England’s starting tighthead as things stand and probably not something you want to change with Tendai Mtawarira looming on the horizon, but there is a case to be argued that Sinckler has possibly leapfrogged Paul Hill this season as Cole’s deputy.

Full disclosure time. This writer has endorsed Hill to the hilt.

He is, without question, the most physically-destructive and technically-refined tighthead that I have seen at U20 level.

There is no doubting Hill’s potential or even his current ability, but Northampton seem to have recognised that England have identified Hill as their man of the future and are pushing forward Kieran Brookes – no slouch at tighthead, himself – as a result.

The positive of this is that it means Hill will be heading into the Test window fresh and with very little wear on his body, but it also means that he is missing out on the sharpness that being at the coalface for 60 minutes a game brings.

Hill is one of those rare players who you can watch at U20 level - and then making their bow in senior club rugby - and you just sense something special from them. He has all the skills required to make himself the best tighthead prop in the world within a few years if he continues to work hard, but it’s a competitive position for England and his place in the matchday 23 is not guaranteed.

It’s certainly a nice problem for Eddie Jones to have.

Whilst a number of nations are scrambling around trying to find just one truly Test-calibre tighthead, Jones has an experienced and effective starter in Cole, two fiercely talented young bulls in Sinckler and Hill, as well as several others – Brookes, Henry Thomas and Jake Cooper-Woolley – all pushing for opportunities.

Sinckler made Jones’ recent 45-man Elite Player Squad but wasn’t included in the 37-man training squad for the upcoming autumn internationals. Cole and Hill are the tightheads Jones looks likely to continue with against South Africa, Argentina, Fiji and Australia this November, but there is little doubt that Sinckler is ready to step up if called upon.

From the fiery and physical lump of raw potential that emerged from the U20s three years ago, Sinckler is turning himself into one of the more technically-proficient props in the English game and his battle with Hill over the next decade should be fascinating to watch, not to mention helping drive both players to be the best they can.