Slade's 'awesome' experience

By Mark Stevens

Henry Slade described making his full England debut on Saturday night as “awesome” as Stuart Lancaster’s side kicked off their Rugby World Cup preparations with a 19-14 victory against France.

The 22-year-old was one of three Exeter Chiefs players to figure in the clash at Twickenham, joining new club-mate Geoff Parling in the starting line-up, whilst fellow debutant Luke Cowan-Dickie was introduced into the fray in the second period.

Wingers Anthony Watson (2) and Jonny May claimed England’s three tries, two of which were converted by Owen Farrell, whilst the French countered with three first half penalties from Morgan Parra and a second half try from Fulgence Ouedraogo.

For Slade, though, featuring for the Red Rose country at senior level was the stuff of dreams - and the Plymouth-born back didn’t disappoint as he put in an accomplished display at centre alongside Bath’s Sam Burgess.

“I’ve been dreaming of this moment for a while now, years and years, and for it to finally come true was awesome,” said Slade post-match.  “It was a great crowd, a great atmosphere and with a great bunch of boys, so I’m really pleased with how it went.”

With a lot of focus pre-match on the Burgess-Slade partnership, both men stood up impressively in front of the watching Lancaster, who has to name his World Cup squad at the end of the month.

“I thought I did all right,” added Slade, who last season picked up both the Premiership and Rugby Players’ Association Young Player of the Year titles. “It was my first game of the season so there’s going to be things to work on, individually and as a team, but the building blocks are there and the intensity and work rate was good, so there are things to build on.”

And as for his fledgling combination with former Rugby League star Burgess, who only moved into the 15-man game ten months ago, Slade said: “It felt good and it went well all week in training. He’s a big lad so obviously physically he’s very good and he put some big shots in in defence, which put us back on the front foot which is key. I really enjoyed playing with him, getting that combination going and it worked well.”

Certainly Slade won plenty of plaudits for his on-field display with Lancaster, former England coach Sir Clive Woodward and World Cup winners Jason Robinson and Will Greenwood all speaking highly of the young playmaker.

But having been given a taste of the big time, Slade is obviously keen for more and he is hoping his display will be enough to see him feature in one of England’s two remaining warm-up clashes against France this Saturday and then Ireland at Twickenham a week later.

“I really enjoyed myself,” he said. “It’s a big stage, a big crowd and a big atmosphere to go into and I just enjoyed to really enjoy every minute of it. At one point, after the first five minutes once I’d settled into my game, I blinked and there was half an hour gone! The first half went pretty quickly and it probably shows how much I was enjoying it.”

“I was relatively happy with how I went. I was a bit rusty but it was the first game of the season so you sort of expect that. All I can do is play as well as I can and see what happens.”

Despite the pace and skill level on show, Slade - as he did all last term - masterfully showed his vast array of talent, including a sublime offload to set up Watson for one of his two tries.

“Some parts were really fast and really physical, but I think the way we’ve played at Exeter has been that way and prepared me nicely,” he said. “The way we played and the structure we had in attack was good and the organisation as well. One of the main bonuses we can take is that the stuff we’ve been working on through pre-season was coming out and being shown and that’s a positive.”

And asked whether his display on Saturday would be enough to convince Lancaster to stick with him for this autumn’s tournament, Slade - as he does - played a cool bat to the question.

He added:  “I’ve got to head back down in training and see where we go from there. You’ve got to work hard but you never know.”