Friday 1 March 2019 09:56, UK
Ben Youngs has played down this week’s training ground brawl between England and Georgia’s forwards.
England coach Eddie Jones had invited Georgia to help put his squad through their paces during a three-day camp in Oxford ahead of next week's clash with Italy.
But fists flew on at least one occasion as tempers flared on the training field in a heated incident which was reportedly witnessed by a group of schoolchildren.
Youngs said he was some distance away from the incident, but insisted exchanges like that are perfectly normal in training.
"You can't expect big physical Georgia backs not to bring it when they come here," Youngs told Sky Sports News.
"You want to be tested. There are a lot of big men in there and sometimes that happens but then 30 seconds later you are down scrummaging again and away you go."
England forwards coach Steve Borthwick added: "As sometimes happens in training there was some pushing and shoving and that's about it. You get on with the next scrum.
"The guys scrummed hard against each other, there was some pushing and shoving, which happens in rugby. It happened quite a lot throughout my career - a bit of pushing and shoving that settles down and you get on with what you need to do."
Asked if England would reconsider extending similar invitations to Georgia in future, Borthwick said: "We're always looking at what the best training's going to be for us going forward, and these two days have been excellent - really good for the team.
"It's good experience, and good competition on the training field, which is excellent, exactly what we want.
"Our training plans going forward, we're always looking at how we can improve them. We'll always look at different options."
