{"id":248756,"date":"2025-07-08T19:14:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-08T19:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/248756\/"},"modified":"2025-07-08T19:14:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-08T19:14:10","slug":"maro-itoje-would-welcome-owen-farrell-england-return","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/248756\/","title":{"rendered":"Maro Itoje would welcome Owen Farrell England return"},"content":{"rendered":"

Called up to replace Elliot Daly last week,<\/a> Farrell took part in his first full training session with the Lions on Tuesday. <\/p>\n

Itjoe – who took over from Jamie George<\/a> as England captain before this year’s Six Nations – said he is excited about what the now four-time Lions tourist can bring to the table in Australia. <\/p>\n

It is highly likely that Farrell, who can provide cover at fly-half and inside centre, will play against the AU-NZ Invitational side in Adelaide on Saturday. <\/p>\n

It will be 10 weeks since he last played a game, having suffered a concussion with his former club Racing.<\/p>\n

“It’s pretty exciting to see what he could potentially bring to us,” said Itoje. <\/p>\n

“Owen and I actually went to the same school. When I was in Year 7, he was in Year 10 – so I’ve known Owen since I was literally 11.<\/p>\n

“But he didn’t start talking to me until maybe I was 12 or so. The Year 10s didn’t really speak to the Year 7s. When I got to Year 8, he started to talk. <\/p>\n

“I have a very good relationship with him. And he just wants the squad to do well. He’s obviously back at Saracens now, which is great.”<\/p>\n

Itoje, who returns to the lions side for Wednesday’s game against the Brumbies, was also asked if he is bemused at the way people react to Farrell. <\/p>\n

“It’s quite remarkable, really,” he said. “He does provoke pretty strong reactions, either way. It’s pretty crazy.<\/p>\n

“I’m sure he’s thinking, like, ‘what did I do?’ But no, he’s fine, and I think everything will be cool.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Called up to replace Elliot Daly last week, Farrell took part in his first full training session with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248757,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4102],"tags":[4151,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-248756","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-rugby","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248756\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}