Harry Mallinder will start at fly half once more as England Under-20 gun for top spot in Pool B of the World Rugby Under-20s Championships on Wednesday evening.
Despite winning both of their opening matches in Manchester, only victory over the young Wallabies would guarantee progression as top seeds.
That’s because Australia bounced back impressively from their opening loss to Scotland to topple the Italians on Saturday afternoon, meaning they could in turn surpass the tournament hosts at the top of the table.
With that in mind, head coach Martin Haag isn’t looking beyond the Salford meet.
“We are not focussing too much on other people or beyond the pool stages,” he commented. “It’s about the here and now and trying to get a good result against Australia and we know that we have to play at the highest level in order to do that.
“For us we’ll take it game by game in an attempt to progress to a level that we can be really proud of.”
The game, which kicks off at 7:30pm, is being shown live on Sky Sports 3.
ENGLAND UNDER-20 TEAM TO PLAY AUSTRALIA
World Rugby U20 Championships
AJ Bell Stadium
Wednesday, June 15th, 2016
Kick off 7:30pm
15 Darren Atkins (Bath Rugby)
14 George Perkins (Saracens)
13 Joe Marchant (Harlequins)
12 Johnny Williams (London Irish)
11 Matt Gallagher (Saracens)
10 Harry Mallinder (Northampton Saints)
9 Harry Randall (Gloucester Rugby)
1 Lewis Boyce (Yorkshire Carnegie)
2 Jack Walker (Yorkshire Carnegie)(capt)
3 Will Stuart (Wasps)
4 Stan South (Harlequins)
5 Huw Taylor (Worcester Warriors)
6 George Nott (Sale Sharks)
7 Will Evans (Leicester Tigers)
8 Zach Mercer (Bath Rugby)
16 Jack Singleton (Worcester Warriors)
17 Billy Keast (Exeter Chiefs)
18 Billy Walker (Saracens)
19 Jack Willis (Wasps)
20 Josh Bainbridge (Yorkshire Carnegie)
21 Max Green (Yorkshire Carnegie)
22 Max Malins (Saracens)
23 Max Wright (Yorkshire Carnegie)
