{"id":681981,"date":"2026-01-08T10:19:17","date_gmt":"2026-01-08T10:19:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/681981\/"},"modified":"2026-01-08T10:19:17","modified_gmt":"2026-01-08T10:19:17","slug":"dallaglio-outlines-need-for-pollock-to-greatly-help-his-cause-for-england-berth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/681981\/","title":{"rendered":"Dallaglio outlines need for Pollock to ‘greatly help his cause’ for England berth"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lawrence Dallaglio has highlighted a huge opportunity for Henry Pollock to cement an England spot ahead of Six Nations selection by delivering on enemy soil in Sunday\u2019s Champions Cup final rematch.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The young Northampton star was the talk of last season\u2019s showpiece after being caught up in a post-match fracas at Cardiff\u2019s Principality Stadium and taunted by Bordeaux players.<\/p>\n

Pollock was grabbed by the throat by Jefferson Poirot, sledged by Matthieu Jalibert and later mocked by Tevita Tatafu.<\/p>\n

\u2018England are sort of plugging the gap\u2019<\/p>\n

The Saints back-row turns 21 next week, but has already come of age as an international star, earning British and Irish Lions selection and scoring three tries in five England appearances.<\/p>\n

With nearly a quarter of a million followers on Instagram, he has quickly become one of rugby\u2019s best-known players. He has yet to start a Test match, however, and that is the next step for the Banbury-born showstopper.<\/p>\n

Dallaglio knows a thing or two about back row play and, with Bordeaux-bound Tom Willis out of the England selection picture, says the race is very much on for his old England No.8 shirt.<\/p>\n

\u201cTom is head and shoulders the best number eight in the Prem, by some distance,\u201d says the World Cup winner. \u201cHe\u2019s beaten twice as many defenders as the bloke in second place.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hugely disappointing that he\u2019s no longer available, as I genuinely believed he was a future England captain, but Steve Borthwick has made the sensible decision to move on quickly, and England are sort of plugging the gap.<\/p>\n

Northampton Saints star backed to break into England squad and why Steve Borthwick should be taking notes<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cBen Earl has done an outstanding job, and Greg Fisilau is definitely pushing, though not there yet. Chandler Cunningham-South started against Fiji, but when your team [Harlequins] gets beaten by 20 or 30 every week, it\u2019s hard to shine, other than on tackle count.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then there is Pollock, who started a couple of games for the Lions at number eight and played there for Saints at Bath last week, scoring two tries, when they did quite a number on the Prem champions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re a month out from the Six Nations<\/a>. If you\u2019re Steve [Borthwick], knowing England\u2019s campaign climaxes against France in Paris and they have three away games, of course, you\u2019re going to put a little bit more currency on [club] performances away from home.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo do I think he\u2019ll be looking out this weekend for players making a statement away from home? Too right, because I know I would be.<\/p>\n

Want more from Planet Rugby? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list<\/a> for world-class coverage you can trust.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t tend to set too much store by players who play at home spectacularly well,\u201d Dallaglio adds. \u201cWe can all do that, no matter what nationality you are. You\u2019re spoon-fed, really, when you\u2019re playing at home. You\u2019ve got your own fans, you\u2019re sleeping in your own bed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat catches my eye are the players that go away from home and deliver. It doesn\u2019t guarantee you selection, but it makes a big statement.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Henry has achieved in his short career what the majority of people set out to achieve across their whole career\u2019<\/p>\n

Of all the aforementioned contenders for the No. 8 slot, only Pollock has an away date in the Champions Cup. Given the opposition and it being the tie of the round, Dallaglio is excited to see how he fares.<\/p>\n

\u201cHenry has achieved in his short career what the majority of people set out to achieve across their whole career,\u201d he adds. \u201cAnd he\u2019s improving all the time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYou want to be in the conversation, whatever that conversation is, after every game. He seems to do that more often than not!<\/p>\n

\u201cWhether he starts or comes off the bench, either for England<\/a> or Northampton, he\u2019s impacting the outcome of games. He seems equally effective in either position but, of course, he will want to start.<\/p>\n

\u201cLaying down a marker away from home will greatly help his cause, because that\u2019s difficult to do. Just ask Toulouse (beaten away by Glasgow in the last round).\u201d<\/p>\n

Ranking England\u2019s backline depth chart ahead of 2026 as Steve Borthwick faces \u2018big call\u2019<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Dallaglio is this weekend on punditry duty at the games involving Sale and Saracens for Premier Sports, who on Wednesday announced they are to broadcast five live matches in the upcoming men\u2019s Six Nations: Italy v Scotland, Wales v France, Wales v Scotland, Scotland v France and Wales v Italy.<\/p>\n

Before France embark on their title defence, we get to see more of Bordeaux\u2019s \u2013 and Dallaglio believes Yannick Bru\u2019s side are \u201cas well placed to retain their title as anyone has been in this competition\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo doubt Northampton have the toughest of assignments, but, as Bath and Quins have found to their cost recently, they are in red-hot form and have the sort of game that doesn\u2019t suggest they\u2019re going to go down lightly or without a fight.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s also probably a little bit of, I wouldn\u2019t say bad blood, but certainly a few scores to settle after what happened after the final. But that\u2019s okay as well. Great sport is all about rivalry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lawrence Dallaglio is part of the 40-strong TV team at\u00a0Premier Sports\u00a0\u2013 the home of Investec Champions Cup across the UK and Ireland with every match live including 21 EPCR Challenge Cup games and all the knock-out stages and finals. Big Games. Bigger Moments \u2013\u00a0visit\u00a0<\/b>premiersports.com<\/b><\/a>\u00a0to join in from just \u00a311.99 a month.<\/b><\/p>\n

READ MORE: Six Nations announce surprise broadcast deal as major player grows rugby portfolio<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lawrence Dallaglio has highlighted a huge opportunity for Henry Pollock to cement an England spot ahead of Six…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":681982,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4102],"tags":[2383,393,225,191668,71853,12,10327,4151,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-681981","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-champions-cup","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-home-page","11":"tag-investec-champions-cup","12":"tag-lawrence-dallaglio","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-northampton-saints","15":"tag-rugby","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115858975278421646","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681981","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=681981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/681981\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/681982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=681981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=681981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=681981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}