Exeter Chiefs director of rugby Rob Baxter has lauded the ‘outstanding’ performance of England international Ethan Roots, and feels it could put him back in the reckoning for the Six Nations.
Roots featured in four of England’s Six Nations Tests last year, winning Man of the Match in his debut against Italy, but has found himself out of Steve Borthwick’s squads since.
The New Zealand native was drafted into the squad for the Summer tour of Japan and New Zealand, but didn’t feature in any of the three Tests and was later dropped for the Autumn Nations Series.
“That will put him back in the England reckoning”
Speaking to Planet Rugby following Exeter’s 22-15 win over Gloucester – their first win of the Premiership campaign – Baxter was full of praise for his number six, who he claimed was Man of the Match in the victory.
“I thought Ethan (Roots) was Man of the Match,” Baxter said.
“On carry quality, carry number, defensive actions and big moments, I would have thought he would have been, because that’s how good he was; and I actually said that to him in the changing room I thought he was outstanding today.”
The DoR added: “He took a lot of knocking over when carrying and he made some real big moments; I would probably say that moment where he gets off the line and makes that big tackle, gets up, and wins the turnover, that probably defines the momentum of the game almost more than their interception try, because he changed that scenario.”
“That was exactly the performance that will put him back in the England reckoning.”
Stats behind Ethan Roots’ performance v Gloucester
The imposing back-rower, who joined Exeter from Ospreys last year as a direct replacement for Dave Ewers, was a one-man wrecking ball in the win.
In attack, he contributed 13 carries for 24 metres – impressive considering the traffic he ran through – and also managed to beat two defenders in the process. He also contributed heavily to the efforts in the lineout, winning four.
He was just as busy in defence too, notching a steady 10 tackles in his stint and also made one dominant tackle to boot. Roots also won one turnover.
Roots faces a big task to overtake the likes of Ted Hill, Chandler Cunningham-South and Ben Curry in Borthwick’s squad, but on today’s showing he is going a long way to making a return to the fold.
