Apprentice Alex ready to run with the big dogs

NORTHAMPTON scrumhalf Alex Mitchell is determined to make the most of his shock Six Nations call-up by continuing to apply pressure on Ben Youngs and Willi Heinz.

- NEALE HARVEY

Whenever rugby resumes, livewire No.9 Mitchell will find himself at the front of a queue of young pivots thrusting themselves forwards for Red Rose recognition.

Youngs shows no sign of fading while Heinz has proved an impressive leader, but both are the wrong side of 30 and at some stage the older guard must change.

Mitchell is battling it out with the likes of Exeter’s Jack Maunder, Harry Randall (Bristol) and Ben White (Leicester) to be new kids on the block, but the Saints youngster clearly has something going for him after being called-up so quickly after recovering from injury.

The 22-year-old had not even played a first team game for Saints after eight months out after tearing a meniscus in his knee while playing for England in an uncapped match against the Barbarians last summer, yet England head coach Eddie Jones issued the recall.

“It was a big surprise,” Mitchell told The Rugby Paper. “I’d not even played for eight months and the last game I’d played before the Six Nations had been in the summer, so it did come out of the blue and it felt pretty weird to go into that camp as an apprentice.