By Frank Dalleres
England will be deprived of captain Owen Farrell for their first two games of the Rugby World Cup after he was handed a four-match ban for his high tackle against Wales earlier this month.
Farrell was initially shown a yellow card for the challenge on Taine Basham, which was then upgraded to a red on video review, only for it to be quashed at a disciplinary hearing last week.
But World Rugby appealed against the decision by a Six Nations independent committee and a second hearing on Tuesday found the fly-half guilty.
He was banned for four games, backdated to last week, so will miss England’s final warm-up match and the Pool D fixtures against Argentina and Japan.
England could yet lose Billy Vunipola too. The No8 was due to attend a disciplinary hearing this evening after being sent off in similar circumstances in last weekend’s defeat by Ireland.
It continues to a troubled build-up to the World Cup, which starts in France next month, for England and their head coach Steve Borthwick.
They have lost five of eight matches since Borthwick took charge at the start of the year and have just one more fixture, against Fiji on Saturday, before the tournament.
England are due to begin their campaign on 9 September in Marseille against Argentina, their main rivals in a pool that also includes Japan, Samoa and Chile.
Scrum-half Danny Care, meanwhile, insists the players are honing their tackling technique in order to avoid any further dismissals.
“We are not going out there to try and be ill-disciplined but we have to learn from it,” Care told BBC Sport.
“We are working on our tackle technique every day. We get referees in every day, who are trying to help us out.
“In big games, you need 15 players on the pitch. There will be some [red cards] in the World Cup and we are just hoping they are not ours.”
