Five Warriors in England squad
Five Wigan Warriors players have been named in Shaun Wane’s first England training squad of 2022 – a year which includes a mid-season international against the Combined Nations All Stars in June and culminates with the Rugby League World Cup (RWLC2021) in the Autumn.
John Bateman, Liam Farrell, Zak Hardaker, Liam Marshall and Kai Pearce-Paul have all been included.
It is a first senior call-up for Marshall and Pearce-Paul, while Bateman, Farrell and Hardaker are all named again following their involvement in last year’s international match against France.
The five Wigan players will link-up with 25 other Betfred Super League players at Leeds’ Headingley Stadium on Tuesday 15th March.
Headingley will be the first in a series of monthly sessions with players throughout 2022, as England build towards the postponed RLWC2021. Wane will factor in form and fitness when inviting players to future sessions. NRL players are not available for either the training sessions or the mid-season international.
England Head Coach, Wane, says: “It’s a massive year for us, a great opportunity that we must be well prepared for.
“We’ve looked at a number of things in putting this training squad together – form last year, performances in the All Stars and France games, pre-season training and discussions around up and coming young players.
“The players included for this first session need to look like England players and train like England players. We want something extra from them at this level.
“The younger players coming through are a real credit to Paul Anderson and Paul Sculthorpe on the performance pathway, club coaches and junior coaches too. To me it doesn’t matter whether you’re 17 or 37, if I think you can help us win a World Cup you’ll be in the squad.
“I’ve spoken to a lot of players and the ones not included at this stage know that they can still force their way in. It’s an open book and I see some of them coming back in later in the year.”
Training squad in full:
John Bateman (Wigan Warriors), Daryl Clark (Warrington Wolves), Mike Cooper (Warrington Wolves), Ben Currie (Warrington Wolves), Tom Davies (Catalans Dragons), Lewis Dodd (St Helens), Niall Evalds (Castleford Tigers), Liam Farrell (Wigan Warriors), Ryan Hall (Hull KR), Zak Hardaker (Wigan Warriors), Morgan Knowles (St Helens), Kruise Leeming (Leeds Rhinos), Matthew Lees (St Helens), Jonny Lomax (St Helens), Reece Lyne (Wakefield Trinity), Jermaine McGillvary (Huddersfield Giants), Paul McShane (Castleford Tigers), Tommy Makinson (St Helens), Liam Marshall (Wigan Warriors), Harry Newman (Leeds Rhinos), Mikolaj Oledzki (Leeds Rhinos), Kai Pearce-Paul (Wigan Warriors), Mark Percival (St Helens), Stefan Ratchford (Warrington Wolves), Dan Sarginson (Salford Red Devils) , Sam Tomkins (Catalans Dragons), Alex Walmsley (St Helens), Jake Wardle (Huddersfield Giants), Jack Welsby (St Helens), George Williams (Warrington Wolves).
Further England training sessions will take place in April, May, July and August.
Details of June’s mid-season international versus the Combined Nations All Stars will be announced on Friday 4th March.
England play Fiji in a World Cup warm-up match at Rochdale on Friday 7th October.
RLWC2021 begins on Saturday 15th October, with England versus Samoa at St James’s Park, Newcastle.
