Ronan O’Gara believes that George Ford remains England’s first choice out-half despite being dropped for Saturday night’s Rugby World Cup clash with Wales.
Ford wore the number ten jersey in England’s opening Pool A game against Fiji, when they struggled at times.
His friend and rival Owen Farrell has been picked ahead of him, though former Ireland out-half O’Gara believes Ford is still the better player out of the two.
“In the game now, with the amount of internationals played, so may players become internationals,” said the country’s record points scorer.
“There’s such emphasis on the squad and the Australia game is a week later.
"If George Ford doesn’t play against Australia he’s most definitely dropped, but at the minute they feel Farrell is a better option for this game.
“If I was George Ford I would find it difficult because you want to play in those big games and Wales is a big game.
“Farrell is a good game manager, but I don’t think he has the x factor. I think England will look to their pack to do a job on Wales with Farrell playing the percentages.”
O'Gara continued: “They may look to Ford for the last 20 minutes.
“There’s a subplot involved and that’s why we all love it – Andy Farrell is Owen’s dad and he’s England coach and Mike Ford is George Ford’s dad and he’s director of rugby at Bath so there’s a great lot of politics going on. That’s why its so juicy.”
Ford took over as first choice out-half from Farrell in head coach Stuart Lancaster’s plans late last year and he held the role through the Six Nations.
He was picked for the Fiji game, but has now lost his place to Farrell for this crunch clash at Twickenham.
England, along with Wales and Australia, are in the toughest pool at the Rugby World Cup and one of the game’s powerhouses is going to be eliminated before the knock-out stages.
O’Gara revealed that he wasn’t hugely impressed by Australia in their win over Fiji and he is backing England to beat injury-hit Wales.
Japan pulled off the shock of the tournament so far when they beat South Africa, though the Munster man doesn’t expect Ireland to fall to any unexpected defeats.
Joe Schmidt’s team take on Romania on Sunday and he is tipping them for a win with a much-changed side.
“Romania played France and Romania were dogged. Japan are capable of playing a structured game,” he explained.
“There’s a big difference – Romania and Georgia are the type of team that are stoppers and can keep the score down, but I don’t think they have a chance of winning, to be honest.”
