Rory Brand and Josh Basham have been named in the England Under-20s starting line-up for this Friday's U20 Six Nations clash against Scotland at Myreside (kick-off 7.30pm).

Brand, who is handed his first start in this year's tournament, gets the nod at scrum-half, while Basham packs down at blindside flanker.

England Under-20s head coach Steve Bates said: “We are looking for another step forward in terms of our intent to play rugby.

“We had a much-improved performance against Wales, but we are still looking to improve in certain areas of our game which we felt did not go quite as well as we would have liked.

“We saw some good individual performances against Wales, now we want to play cohesively as a team.

“Scotland at home will be dangerous opponents, their previous results are not necessarily an indicator of a side’s potential as it takes a while to get together as a team in this tournament and we’re expecting a spirited performance off them.

“It’s the curtain raiser to the big game on Saturday and they will want to set the tone so we’ll be ready for a passionate Scotland team.”

England U20s team to face Scotland

15. Jordan Olowofela
14. Tom Seabrook
13. Ollie Lawrence
12. Will Butler - capt
11. Cadan Murley
10. Tom Hardwick
9. Rory Brand 

1. Alex Seville
2. Gabriel Oghre
3. Ehren Painter
4. Ted Hill
5. Sam Lewis
6. Josh Basham
7. Aaron Hinkley
8. Sam Moore

Replacements:

16. Beck Cutting
17. Toby Trinder
18. Joe Heyes
19. James Scott
20. Sean Reffell
21. Ben White
22. James Grayson
23. Fraser Dingwall

England U20 Six Nations fixtures and results:

Italy v England: 17-27

England v Wales: 37-12

Scotland v England
Friday 23 February, KO 7.30pm
Myreside, Edinburgh

France v England 
Friday 9 March, KO 9pm (8pm GMT)
Stade de la Mediterranee, Beziers

England v Ireland 
Friday 16 March, KO 8pm – live on Sky Sports Action
Ricoh Arena, Coventry

Tickets available here.

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