{"id":197716,"date":"2025-10-13T19:12:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-13T19:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/197716\/"},"modified":"2025-10-13T19:12:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-13T19:12:09","slug":"england-boss-shaun-wane-on-hull-kr-hooker-jez-littens-starting-chances-and-his-joe-burgess-choice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/197716\/","title":{"rendered":"England boss Shaun Wane on Hull KR hooker Jez Litten’s starting chances and his Joe Burgess choice"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Hull\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Hull KR man Jez Litten was the best hooker in Super League this season and could be a starter for England later this month. That\u2019s according to England head coach Shaun Wane, who named his 24-man squad on Monday afternoon ahead of this autumn\u2019s Ashes series against Australia.<\/p>\n

Litten is one of two hookers set to be involved for England against the Kangaroos, with St Helens\u2019 Daryl Clark being the other number nine selected. Of course, Danny Walker and Brad O\u2019Neill had been hoping to be involved in the series but the pair miss out with Wane selecting the treble winning Litten, who scored a decisive try in Saturday\u2019s Grand Final.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s no surprise to see the Rovers man involved given the year he\u2019s had and after earning a spot in the Dream Team and winning the Robins<\/a>\u2018 player of the year award, he\u2019ll hope to end the year by adding to the one cap he won against France in 2023.<\/p>\n

Shaun Wane on Hull KR hooker Jez Litten<\/p>\n

\u201cJez has been the best nine in the comp this year,\u201d Wane said during his first Ashes press conference at the team hotel in Worsley. \u201cHe\u2019s fixed his game.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat Willie has done there at Hull KR with that team and with Jez in particular, he\u2019s just changed him around. He\u2019s done a great job. Jez is a great player.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked how close Litten was to being considered a starter for England, Wane added: \u201cHe\u2019s close, very close but so is Daz (Clark). It\u2019s not a XIII, it\u2019s a XVII and the people off the bench are just important as the starting XIII but he\u2019s very close. He\u2019s a good player and I\u2019ve a lot of time for Jez.\u201d<\/p>\n

Litten was one of three Rovers players named in the squad with Rob Burrow Award winner Mikey Lewis and Saturday\u2019s double-try scoring Grand Final hero Joe Burgess also included in the fold. Burgess has been one of KR\u2019s key men this season and his selection was most certainly a justified one.<\/p>\n

\u201cI spoke to him on Sunday so he wasn\u2019t in that good form, if you know what I mean,\u201d Wane laughed, with Rovers\u2019 Grand Final celebrations going on long into Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was really pleased and I had spoke to him a few weeks ago about his form and he\u2019s going well for Hull KR. I know what he can do.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe did a great job for me at Wigan. I know what he\u2019s capable of, Budgie. He\u2019s a great kid and he\u2019s going to be a fantastic asset to the 24.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pushed on the players he had to think about following Saturday\u2019s Grand Final, Wane added: \u201cThere was a few. Brad and Jez and Mikey gripped the game. He needs to do a bit more of that, Mikey and he knows that. Budgie (Burgess) was really impressive.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought Elliot Minchella was good, defended really well, but he\u2019s not made the squad which is credit to all the coaches in Super League, there\u2019s so many players who could\u2019ve made the 24. There was a few things that went through my mind, private things.<\/p>\n

\u201cI went through every player yesterday who was in the squad and I went through players that weren\u2019t in the squad so yesterday was a really tough day for me.<\/p>\n

\u201cI must say the response from all the players what weren\u2019t in the squad was unbelievably good. The spirit and how they took the bad news from me, they wanted the team to crack on and they\u2019ll come to the hotel and carry on visiting us because they\u2019re part of the squad, they just want us to do well in the Ashes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hull KR man Jez Litten was the best hooker in Super League this season and could be a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":197717,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-197716","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\/197716","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=197716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197716\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/197717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}