The England fly-half battle is back
The Telegraph Rugby Podcast
The Telegraph
4.5 • 679 Ratings
🗓️ 27 October 2025
⏱️ 52 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The autumn internationals are back and so is the Telegraph Rugby podcast!
Join Alan Dymock, Gavin Mairs and Charles Richardson ahead of this weekend's action as we take a close look at England and their clash against the Wallabies on Saturday.
The guys discuss how the back row will look in the absence of Tom Willis and discuss if Steve Borthwick is right to leave him out after he confirmed he will be moving to France at the end of the season.
Alan, Gavin and Charles also give their thoughts on who will start at fly-half for England with Fin Smith, Marcus Smith and George Ford all fit and available and whether Saracens teenager Noah Calouri will get a chance after a blistering start to the season.
Plus, we take a look at Ireland v New Zealand this weekend in Chicago, a repeat of their 2016 classic, and field your questions as always, too!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Telegraph. |
| 0:06.8 | Home to the Emirates-Dubai Sevens, Dubai is the ultimate sporting break, with a packed events calendar every year, including the DP World Tour Golf Championship and the Dubai tennis championships. |
| 0:20.3 | There are lots of opportunities to witness world-class sport in action. |
| 0:24.2 | And if you're looking to have your own active adventure holiday, you'll be spoiled for choice, |
| 0:28.9 | whether that's hitting the paddle court or hiking the mountains of Hatter. |
| 0:33.6 | Plan your getaway at visit Dubai.com. |
| 0:37.0 | Thank you. Plan your getaway at visit Dubai.com. |
| 0:50.2 | The leaves are turning colour, the nights are getting darker, and autumn test rugby is back. |
| 0:59.2 | Welcome to the Telegraph Rugby podcast. My name is Alan Dimmick. I'm a commissioning editor for sport here. And I am joined, as ever, by Charles Richardson. |
| 1:00.1 | Hello. And welcoming into the studio, Gavin Mears. Gavin, how are you? Welcome. Thanks, guys. Yeah, lovely to be here. Makes a change from those late-night calls from Perth and Ireland and Sydney and |
| 1:11.8 | last time we saw you you had a breeze block background in some stadium somewhere in Australia |
| 1:16.0 | trying to get Wi-Fi connection issues 4-4 error Charles how are you very well looking |
| 1:22.1 | forward to the autumn enjoyed the Prem great round that we've come come into the autumn from |
| 1:26.7 | and looking forward to seeing some more some some more good stuff on the pitch. |
| 1:30.4 | Well, we'll be chatting all things autumn rugby. Lines Tour, distant memory, focusing on England. We've got a big old Ireland matchup to come and all things talking about the other home nations. |
| 1:41.8 | This is Test Rugby and we'll get stuck into it all now. |
| 1:49.6 | Steve Borthwick has named his squads for this one. No Tom Willis in this. We sort of knew that |
| 1:55.6 | was coming thanks to some sterling work from yourself uncovering that one. Firstly, I think it would be |
| 2:00.1 | good to know how that came about |
| 2:01.8 | and how much of a surprise it was that Tom Willis, |
| 2:04.6 | having opted to go to France, |
| 2:07.1 | was not going to be involved anyway? |
... |
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