From today's Times:

Onus on Joe Marler as England cut corners

One of the many tricks up his sleeve, that were revealed when Eddie Jones announced the England World Cup squad, was that Joe Marler would have two jobs: he would be in his usual role at loose-head prop but he would be going to Japan as the contingency tight-head too.

Marler, 29, has not played tight-head for a decade. He needs to relearn old skills and he will not be alone.

To make a squad of 31, numbers are tight. Every team will look to cut a corner or two. Many will try to get one prop to cover both sides. It sounds straightforward. Once upon a time, comparatively at least, it was. Not any more.

As one scrum coach put it, props do not want to switch because “they don’t want to get their head shoved up their bottom”. That is typical front-row language for dealing with 16,000 newtons going through the body at engagement. Knowing how to handle it is one of the finest arts on a rugby pitch; get it wrong and you court extreme danger.

Props used to be better at switching, but versatility is now only a quality for World Cups. Up until the 2011 World Cup, the bench allowed for only one prop; versatility was a necessity. Now that we have two props, one for each side, it is becoming an irrelevance. Until the World Cup comes round. We saw this at the weekend. Andrew Porter, the Ireland prop, played the first half against Italy at tight-head and then moved, in the second half, to the other side.


It was easier for Porter. He was a loose-head by trade until he hit the senior ranks and, two years ago, was persuaded to switch.

How did he find it? “Moving across the scrum,” he said, “is like writing with your bad hand.”

That is a gentle way of putting it. “Not many fancy it,” Dorian West, the reserve hooker for England in 2003, and now forwards coach at Sale Sharks, says. “It’s a difficult thing to cope with.”

The “bottom” reference, above came from Trevor Woodman, who played loose-head for England in the 2003 World Cup final, and is now scrum coach at Gloucester. “You are scrummaging against two forces,” he said. “The forces going through you are greater. It’s harder and more uncomfortable.”

In short, when you move to tight-head, you have two shoulders engaged, not one, you are taking the bulk of the weight on a different foot, you are binding with a different arm and, above all, you have all that power coming through both sides of your body.

The technical side of it is where Marler says he has the greater concerns. As a loose-head, he is used to driving more upwards at the tight-head opposite him. Now he has to switch.

If anyone can do it, Marler can. It is not brain science. He is already at the peak of his powers in terms of size and strength. He looks likes an absolute beast.

His back length and height would make him a perfect tight head if he was French. They have tiny TH in terms fo size that us or the rest of the world.

He will only be used in a worst-case scenario and only if we cannot get Williams off his sun lounger in Bali quick smart.

Actually, I think it's more likely to come into play for real in the later stages of the tournament.

The nightmare scenario for an RWC coach is that one of your XXIII has a calf strain or tweaked hamstring that is expected to clear up but fails a late fitness test a couple of days before a knockout game. Even if there's time to fly out a replacement, do you really want to drop someone permanently for an injury that is expected to clear up? That's when you hope that your makeshift tighthead can do enough of a job to survive.

I think it's also worth watching how Eddie uses his props over the next few games - up to and including the early pool games. He subbed Williams on quite late on Sunday, and Genge played the full 80.

At a guess, I think that Joe might well play a few scrums at TH against Italy, and I also would not be surprised if he did against USA and Tonga as well. If we're comfortably up in the games, I could see Eddie taking the starting TH off and letting Joe play a couple of scrums at TH (whether he started as LH or was on the bench) before switching back to cover LH for the rest of the game. If you might need to rely on him in that situation, you want him to have some exposure in the heat of battle - but not so much that the opposition can get a handle on his weak spots.

It also makes me wonder what the pecking order of looseheads is. Does Joe's utility status mean that he's now behind Mako and Genge? Is it that they've tried all the squad props on both sides and concluded that Joe is the one who can best adapt? Are they going to rotate the props and manage their game time anyway? Or is a physically and mentally fresh Joe Marler sufficiently badass that he can take being a frontline LH and backup TH with a flick of his mohawk?

We'll have to wait and see. On the scrum half point, Eddie clearly wasn't happy with any of his backup options until he found Heinz - and then gave him 75 minutes in which he played more like Ben Youngs than Youngs himself did.

What happens if Cole or, more likely, The Sink pick up a ban? No replacement possible if they keep the 2015 rules. An injury in the first few minutes and Joe could be playing nearly a full game.