Where are they now - South West

The third piece in our four-part look at the 2010 U18 English Divisional Rugby Festival brings us to the South West side and there can be no doubt that the team has lived up to the lofty expectations they created for themselves.

The South West side made it to the final of the competition and although defeat to the London and South East side in that game saw them ultimately end up with runners-up honours, they certainly impressed with their performances.

As with the other teams we’ve profiled so far, a large percentage of the players involved in the team fail to carve out professional careers after promising displays at the age-grade level, but in comparison to both the Midlands and North sides, the South West team offers up a cornucopia of players plying their trade professionally.

Before delving into those professional players, we briefly stop to acknowledge four players who have had a measure of success within the game, but have yet to pass that final obstacle preventing them from making it to the higher reaches of the game. Winger Ian Clark and back row Louis Spencer both enjoyed spells with the Gloucester academy, but were unable to turn that into senior contracts with the club, whilst half-back Oliver Massey-Birch currently represents both Taunton in National Two South as well as studying at Cardiff Metropolitan. Another student, Rob Coote of Exeter University, helped Great Britain win the World University Sevens Championships, as well as representing Exeter Chiefs in the same format of the game.

Now we move onto the players playing their rugby in the top two tiers of the English leagues and there is no shortage of success stories. Aaron Penberthy of Jersey RFC and Mike Daniels of Worcester Warriors both regularly turn out for their sides in The Green King IPA Championship. Penberthy guides an ever-improving Jersey side from fly-half, whilst Daniels, a versatile prop, also has spells with Bath’s academy and Loughborough Students under his belt, not to mention a season spent playing club rugby in New Zealand. They are likely to be joined in the Championship next season by lock Benjamin White, who is currently at London Welsh, for whom relegation seems all but a certainty.

Onto the Premiership and the players keep coming from a vastly talented South West side. Flanker Will Skuse is currently a member of the Bath academy, as well as a former England U20 representative. He is joined by current and past teammate Tom Dunn, a prop-turned-hooker who recently signed a new contract with Bath after impressing for Bath United in the A League, as well as his select opportunities with the senior squad.

Lock Will Carrick-Smith is another graduate from that South West side and is currently contracted to the Exeter Chiefs. His playing time with the senior squad has been limited thus far, but at 6’ 11”, he is a tremendous physical prospect moving forward for the Devon-based club.

We are now in rarefied circles with the two remaining prospects that have made it in the professional game and we start with current England international Jack Nowell. The full-back, who is also adept at playing on the wing, currently has five senior England caps to his name. He played a starring role in England’s 2013 Junior World Championship-winning campaign and was the first player from that class to go on to make their senior international debut. Since then he has gone on to star for Exeter in the Aviva Premiership, learning his trade as a winger and it is at that position that he currently features for England, albeit losing out to both Jonny May and Anthony Watson at the time of writing.

Nowell is joined by his equally illustrious club teammate Henry Slade, who, believe it or not, was actually on the bench for the South West side back in 2010. A frighteningly talented player, Slade was also part of the 2013 JWC-winning U20 side and is currently knocking on England’s door so loudly that Stuart Lancaster must be going home with migraines each day. The fly-half has demonstrated his great versatility for Exeter this season, often lining up at outside centre and although his future is surely at fly-half, he will certainly benefit defensively from this experience further along the back line.

Given the relatively small returns we have seen from the Midlands and North squads in terms of players going on to play professionally, it’s heartening to see such a good ‘conversion rate’ from the South West side and much of this is testament to the quality of the Bath and Exeter academies, as well as the tutelage of schools such as Truro College, from which three of the mentioned players all graduated.

Join us next week for our fourth and final instalment of this series when we will be looking at the winners of the tournament, the London and South East squad.