LONDON, 28 January 2005 — Jonny Wilkinson has backed his Newcastle club-mate Mathew Tait to help cover England’s midfield injury crisis in next month’s Six Nations opener against Wales even though the teenager has yet to make his Test debut.
Tait, 18, is in England’s squad and could start the Feb. 5 encounter at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium despite only really making a name for himself with Newcastle this season thanks to some impressive domestic and European Cup displays.
“He (Tait) is a hell of a player,” said Wilkinson, who will miss at least the first half of England’s Six Nations campaign because of a knee ligament injury.
“Sometimes you get people saying about football players ‘I saw him when he was 17, and I knew he was going to be big’.
“I have never really understood that sort of concept until I saw Mathew Tait,” explained Wilkinson, now 25, who himself made his England debut as an 18-year-old.
“I looked at him, and I thought that he is going to be a special player. It is great, because I also get to be part of his every-day development.
“I know him well, I train with him a lot and I get to talk to him quite a bit,” Wilkinson added at Wednesday’s Six Nations launch in London.
“He is a player who has immense self-confidence, but never arrogance. He is humble, he works hard, and yet he has the kind of explosive unknown quality when he can just go and do something quite incredible and leave the rest of his team staring in disbelief.”
England will be without World Cup-winning centers Mike Tindall and Will Greenwood because of injury and Tait, who turns 19 the day after the Wales game, could find himself lining up alongside Newcastle teammate Jamie Noon in Cardiff.
Coach Andy Robinson is due to name his side to play Wales on Monday with Matt Dawson in line to end his international exile.
Earlier this season the World Cup-winning scrum-half was axed from the squad after he refused to back out of a prior commitment to take part in a television quiz show rather than attend an England training session.
But Dawson could now displace Andy Gomarsall with Leicester’s Harry Ellis challenging for a bench place.
Last season, England could only finish third in the Six Nations after defeats by Ireland and Grand Slam champions France.
Getting off to a winning start is even more important than usual this time as England’s next two matches see them at home to France and away to Ireland, with Eddie O’Sullivan’s side bidding to go one better than last season’s second place.
Wales haven’t beaten England in Cardiff since 1993 but there is renewed hope among their supporters after their narrow autumn defeats against South Africa and New Zealand that they can now beat their neighbors.
