Six Nations: England set to stand up to Wales' 'bully' tactics, says Billy Vunipola
Tuesday 3 February 2015 15:48, UK
Billy Vunipola says England are ready to stand up to Wales' 'bully' tactics in Friday's Six Nations opener in Cardiff.
Wales coach Warren Gatland announced his side on Monday, 48 hours earlier than expected, in a forcefully confident tactic which highlighted the depth of talent in the home side.
But England No 8 Vunipola believes the decision to make public his starting XV could backfire on Gatland, insisting the visitors will be fired up for the Millennium Stadium showpiece.
“It’s Wales-England, it’s a massive occasion,” he said. “Not just in rugby terms but for people watching... It pushes their (Wales) players to be world class.
“I keep going back to the challenge they’ve already set for us, they’ve named their team early, they basically want to try and bully us and we’ve got to try and stand up to that.”
But England will have to confront Wales – a side filled with British & Irish Lions – with a team that has been hard hit by injuries.
England will take to the field with a new look to their line-up due to a number of first-choice players being made unavailable through injury, including Courtney Lawes, Joe Launchbury, Ben Morgan, Owen Farrell, Manu Tuilagi, David Wilson and Geoff Parling.
Full-back Mike Brown is one England star still available for the tournament opener. Brown is still stacking the trophies from a plaudit-filled 2014 where he was named England Player of the Autumn Series, Six Nations Player of the Championship and Aviva Premiership Player of the Year.
“We have our gameplan and hopefully we can stick to that on the day and it works well for us,” he said.
“It’s going to be tough, we know that. They’ll raise their game for their home crowd, they’re a quality team, world class players in every position, Lions players in all positions as well.
“They’ve shown their quality over a number of years so it’s about us imposing ourselves on the game.”
