Noah Caluori has been rewarded for the spectacular start to his career with a call-up to train with the England squad that will meet this week to prepare for the autumn internationals.
Caluori, 19, the 6ft 5in Saracens wing, scored five tries in a sensational individual performance in the Gallagher Prem victory over Sale Sharks on Saturday, his first start in the competition, excelling with his aerial ability. He has impressed Steve Borthwick sufficiently to be invited to train with a 36-man England squad at Pennyhill Park this week as part of a development agreement with his club.
Borthwick, the England head coach, has dropped Tom Willis, the Saracens No8, who has agreed to join Bordeaux Bègles next season, a move that will rule him out of the 2027 World Cup in Australia, as Borthwick can only pick players based in England. Emeka Ilione, the Leicester flanker who is also capable of playing at No8, has been included in the squad and is one of the players who could profit from Willis’s absence.
Willis will rejoin European champions Bordeaux at the end of the season
GASPAFOTOS/MB MEDIA/GETTY IMAGES
England begin their autumn programme against Australia at Twickenham a week on Saturday and will then play further matches against Fiji, New Zealand and Argentina. Borthwick will name his final squad for for his autumn programme next Sunday.
Willis, 26, the powerful ball-carrier who moved to Saracens from Bordeaux two years ago, has won eight caps, featuring in all five Six Nations matches last season, and started at No8 in both of England’s Test victories in Argentina in July.
During Caluori’s remarkable performance against Sale on Saturday, Sam Warburton, the former Wales captain working for TNT Sports, said: “I haven’t seen a player this good in the air, ever, and he’s a teenager.”
Mark McCall, the Saracens director of rugby, cautioned that his young star still has some way to go. “Noah’s aerial ability is unique, but everyone has got to take a breath,” McCall said. “He’s quite a special player and a great kid as well. He’s a very balanced and sensible young fella who is obviously going to get a lot of attention. He’s capable of dealing with that, but he’s not the perfect player yet — far from it. He knows he has a lot of things to improve on. His ceiling’s absolutely huge, but let’s enjoy him and let him grow in the right way.”
While Caluori’s invitation for the three-day training camp indicates the impact he has made in his first three senior appearances this season — he also scored on his debut from the bench against Newcastle Red Bulls — he has not been included in the full 36-man squad and there are recalls for three other wings, Immanuel Feyi-Waboso, Henry Arundell and Adam Radwan, who have also started the season strongly.
Feyi-Waboso scored his sixth try of the league season in the victory over Harlequins on Sunday
SHUTTERSTOCK EDITORIAL
Feyi-Waboso, the 22-year-old Exeter Chiefs winger, has scored six tries in four Prem matches after missing most of last season with injury. Arundell, 22, has not played for England since he won his tenth cap in the third-place play-off at the 2023 World Cup, having spent two seasons playing in France with Racing 92, but he has scored three tries in his first four matches since joining Bath this season.
Radwan, 27, the lightning quick Leicester Tigers wing, has developed his game since moving to Welford Road from Newcastle last season. He won two England caps in 2021 under Eddie Jones, Borthwick’s predecessor, scoring a hat-trick of tries on his debut against Canada and one against Tonga.
There is no place in Borthwick’s 36-man squad, as expected, for Owen Farrell, who returned to Saracens from Racing 92 this season. Chandler Cunningham-South, another powerful ball carrier who could benefit from the absence of Willis, has been included despite the ankle injury he sustained during Harlequins’ 38-0 defeat by Exeter Chiefs.
Theo Dan, the Saracens hooker, returns to the squad in place of Jamie Blamire, of Leicester, while the Bath centre Max Ojomoh comes in for the injured Seb Atkinson, of Gloucester. Raffi Quirke, the Sale scrum half, is included as Jack van Poortvliet rehabilitates the injury that forced him to miss Leicester’s victory over Bath on Saturday.
England squadForwards Fin Baxter (Harlequins), Ollie Chessum (Leicester), Alex Coles (Northampton), Luke Cowan-Dickie (Sale), Chandler Cunningham-South (Harlequins), Theo Dan (Saracens), Ben Earl (Saracens), Ellis Genge (Bristol), Jamie George (Saracens), Joe Heyes (Leicester), Emeka Ilione (Leicester), Maro Itoje (Saracens), Nick Isiekwe (Saracens), Asher Opoku-Fordjour (Sale), Guy Pepper (Bath) , Henry Pollock (Northampton), Bevan Rodd (Sale), Will Stuart (Bath), Sam Underhill (Bath)Backs Henry Arundell (Bath), Fraser Dingwall (Northampton), Immanuel Feyi-Waboso (Exeter), George Ford (Sale), Tommy Freeman (Northampton), Ollie Lawrence (Bath), Alex Mitchell (Northampton), Cadan Murley (Harlequins), Max Ojomoh (Bath), Raffi Quirke (Sale), Adam Radwan (Leicester), Tom Roebuck (Sale), Henry Slade (Exeter), Fin Smith (Northampton), Marcus Smith (Harlequins), Ben Spencer (Bath), Freddie Steward (Leicester)Rehabilitation Tom Curry (Sale), Elliot Daly (Saracens), Jack van Poortvliet (Leicester)Noah Caluori in squad as part of a development agreement with Saracens