Woodward faces Healey conundrum

Significant changes since his team signed off at Twickenham last April by running France off their feet will tempt Woodward to pick Healey other than on the wing.

Jason Robinson?s meteoric rise from England substitute to a Lions superstar demands that he starts on the left in Dublin with Dan Luger ? form and fitness permitting ? on the right.

Starting his Lions tour as the supposed third- choice scrum half, Healey would have finished it as the Test right wing but for a bulging disc.

By then, he had also overtaken Neil Jenkins and Ronan O ? Gara as the alternative to Wilkinson at stand off, the position from where he won the European Cup for Leicester a fortnight before leaving for Australia.

In any emergency over the fitness of Catt and Greenwood, neither of whom has played since June, Healey is better qualified to cope at fly half than when England put him there at alarmingly short notice in South Africa last summer after Wilkinson withdrew with food poisoning.

Given a clean bill of health in midfield, Healey then becomes a serious contender at scrum half, where he first played under Jack Rowell?s regime.

Woodward has picked him there only once, against Fiji during the World Cup two years ago. If he returns to scrum half next month Matt Dawson and Kyran Bracken, both recent England captains, would be demoted.

The alternative ? leaving Healey on the bench as cover anywhere and everywhere behind the scrum ? would smack of the soft option that Woodward has never been accused of taking.

Although Healey was fined £2,000 for bringing the Lions into disrepute in a newspaper article, Woodward chose yesterday?s launch of England?s 12-Test season to give him a glowing reference as a player and a person and also promised that he will not fall into the jack-of-all-trades category and suffer accordingly.

Woodward said: ? I will never brand Austin as a utility player. He is a brilliant player. He?s on top of his game and we are very fortunate to have him. We want to put him in the team on merit.

?He came back from the Lions with far more positives than anything else. Take away all the nonsense of what happened off the field with the Lions and he was one of the stand-out players. I have never had a problem with Austin.

?I?ve given him some bad news from time to time and he?s always taken it well. I?m one of his biggest fans and I don?t see an issue. If there ever was an issue, he wouldn?t be in the squad and he knows that.

?The Lions tour is history now and I want to move on. There will be no baggage as far as picking the England team is concerned.?

Woodward?s squad gives him new options, Lewis Moody providing the first credible young alternative to his Leicester team-mate Neil Back in the back row. Tigers? lock Ben Kay and Newcastle?s Dave Walder join Moody as the reserves promoted on the strength of their summer Test debuts in America, where Graham Rowntree did enough to change the front row pecking order and reclaim his place as head of the loosehead queue behind Jason Leonard.

Never afraid to promote young players, Woodward was so impressed by Charlie Hodgson?s supervision of Sale?s win at Wasps that he considered elevating him straight to the national squad. Instead, the 21-yearold fly half from Halifax is one of eight additional players summoned for England training next week.

THE SQUAD ? Backs: I Balshaw (Bath), M Perry (Bath), D Luger (Harlequins), A Healey (Leicester), J Robinson (Sale), B Cohen (Northampton), W Greenwood (Harlequins), M Catt (Bath), J Lewsey (Wasps), M Tindall (Bath), J Wilkinson (Newcastle), D Walder (Newcastle), M Dawson (Northampton), K Bracken (Saracens).
Forwards: J Leonard (Harlequins), G Rowntree (Leicester), P Vickery (Gloucester), J White (Bristol), P Greening (Wasps), D West (Leicester), M Johnson (Leicester, capt), D Grewcock (Bath), S Shaw (Wasps), B Kay (Leicester), R Hill (Saracens), N Back (Leicester), L Moody (Leicester), A Sanderson (Sale), J Worsley (Wasps), M Corry (Leicester).