{"id":128856,"date":"2025-09-11T01:18:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-11T01:18:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/128856\/"},"modified":"2025-09-11T01:18:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T01:18:11","slug":"england-announce-coaching-restructure-ahead-of-very-special-phase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/128856\/","title":{"rendered":"England announce coaching restructure ahead of &#8216;very special&#8217; phase"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Mark Mapletoft has been named the new Head of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/teams\/england\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">England<\/a> Men\u2019s Player Pathways, moving on from his role as head coach of the U20 side, which he has held since 2020.<\/p>\n<p>Former England hooker Andy Titterell, who has served as Mapletoft\u2019s deputy since 2020, will take the reins of the U20 side, with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/teams\/saracens\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Saracens<\/a> legend Kevin Sorrell, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/news\/saracens-legend-kevin-sorrell-makes-tough-career-change-decision\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">who left the club after 30 years this summer<\/a>, working as his assistant.<\/p>\n<p>Mapletoft and Titterell enjoyed a successful five years together, guiding England to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/six-nations\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Six Nations<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/world-rugby-u20-championship\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">World Rugby U20 Championship<\/a> glory in 2024, and within one match of a Six Nations Grand Slam this year.<\/p>\n<p>The former England fly-half\u2019s new role will see him \u201cwork on further aligning the England U17 to U20 programmes whilst liaising closely with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/players\/steve-borthwick\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Steve Borthwick<\/a> and PREM Rugby clubs on players of national interest who have graduated from the age-group national teams in recent years,\u201d the RFU confirmed in a statement.<\/p>\n<p>Fixture<\/p>\n<p>Rugby Union Hybrid Friendlies<\/p>\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/100070.png.webp\"\/> <\/p>\n<p> England A <\/p>\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1049.png.webp\"\/> <\/p>\n<p> All Blacks XV <\/p>\n<p>    <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/live\/all-blacks-xv-vs-england-a\/?g=949125\/\" class=\"link-box\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">   <\/p>\n<p>Mapletoft will also take charge of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/teams\/england-a\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">England A<\/a> for their fixture against an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/teams\/new-zealand\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">All Blacks<\/a> XV at the Rec on Saturday, November 8, as he did last year, where a Henry Pollock-inspired England A side defeated <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/teams\/australia\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Australia<\/a> A at the Stoop.<\/p>\n<p>The RFU also confirmed that England U18 coach Jonathan Pendlebury and his assistant Will Parkin will stay in their roles ahead of leading the front five and U18 backs specialist camp at Bisham Abbey this month.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cToday\u2019s new appointments reinforce our aims as a union to support young players to excel in world-leading England teams,\u201d said RFU executive director of performance Conor O\u2019Shea.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMark has done a stellar job in helping realign the age-grade system since returning and his role will enable us to continue to build upon that work within the pathway.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are incredibly excited to see Andy take on the head coach role of the U20 programme and we look forward to this new chapter for him alongside Kevin. Everyone in rugby can see the amount of talent that is coming through the clubs into England, and we are always aiming to make this better and better. We all believe the next phase for English Rugby is going to be very special.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mark Mapletoft has been named the new Head of England Men\u2019s Player Pathways, moving on from his role&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":128857,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-128856","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","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128856"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128856\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}