Parling: Move on from Armitage

England lock Geoff Parling says that England rugby is in great shape and it is time to focus on the players who have been chosen for the World Cup.

The Leicester second rower, who will join Exeter next season, was named in Stuart Lancaster’s 50-man squad alongside the likes of rugby league convert Sam Burgess and Saracens rising star Maro Itoje but there was no place for Toulon flanker Steffon Armitage and Clermont's European Player of the Year Nick Abendanon.

Lancaster refused to activate the 'exceptional circumstances' contingency that would enable him to select overseas-based players like Armitage and Abendanon and Parling, who has won 23 caps for England, says it is time to move on from the whole should they or shouldn’t they have been picked.

“Why don't we concentrate just on the squad that's been picked?” suggested the 31-year-old.

“There's no point talking about something you can't change anyway. Just focus on what we've got and what we can do and go from there.

“I think English rugby in general is in a great position. The Premiership is a very strong league with good teams and good players. The English teams – not just the top team but also all the age group teams – seem to do well.

“The talent that the Under 20s and Under 18s produce in clubs' academies seems to be as strong as it's been in quite a while. There are a lot of young guys coming through.”

Fine margins

Parling missed the start of the Six Nations through injury, but was recalled to the starting line-up for England’s amazing 55-35 win over France on the final day. It was not enough for England to win the Six Nations and Parling is clear that they left too many chances out there – something that they are determined to rectify for the World Cup.

 “I guess the brand of rugby was a positive, but also we could probably say it wasn't a fully positive [game] because we didn't do what we needed to. We had to win by 26 points and we won by 20.

“You can look at the attack but actually we shipped 30 points. If we'd kept one of those tries out we could have won the Championship. Maybe against Scotland, one of those chances where the offload didn't go to hand in that second half, or against Italy. Those moments were big moments because we could have won the Championship.

“Look at when we won the World Cup last time, it was a drop goal. In 2011 the final was separated by a point. Those moments where a kick can easily go an inch to the right or an inch to the left, they can be World Cup defining moments. That's what you train for; to make sure you're on the right end of those moments.”

Tigers ready for Bath

The World Cup may well be looming on the horizon, but Parling’s thoughts are closer to home with Leicester facing Bath in the Aviva Premiership play-offs this weekend.

Leicester secured their play-off place with a 22-14 victory over Northampton last weekend – a game that Parling missed due to a rib injury. And while it is yet to be confirmed if he will be available for Saturday’s clash, Parling is more than willing to throw down the gauntlet to Bath.

“I think Bath will be quite wary of Leicester. I don't think there are many teams that would want to play Leicester in a play-off game,” said Parling.

“We're going down there and they're certainly favourites I guess, from their form during the year but we've got a lot of experience in semi-finals. I've been at the club six years and we've been involved in a semi-final every single year.

“We are eight from nine in the Premiership so we're in good form, and even at the start of those nine games, the important thing was if we weren't playing really well and scoring loads of tries, we were resilient, doing what mattered and sneaking those wins. That put us in a position come the end of the season to sneak into the play-offs.

“We're positive for the game. It's going to be a brilliant game and a brilliant spectacle for everyone and we just can't wait to get stuck in.”

Geoff Parling was talking at the launch of Canterbury's new England training kit