Cipriani is Premiership's best despite England snub
NEWS: Gloucester flyhalf Danny Cipriani was named Premiership Rugby Player of the Month for September 2018.
Despite being left out of Eddie Jones’ latest England squad, Cipriani has been in stellar form for Gloucester as they picked up two wins in their first four matches to establish themselves in the Premiership Rugby top six.
Jones explained that Cipriani’s form was not good enough in the opening rounds of the Premiership and that was why he was left out of his 36-man England squad that attended a three-day training camp in Bristol last week.
“We’ve decided just to have two stand-offs [flyhalves] in the squad for this particular camp because we want them to get a lot of training time,” Jones said last month.
“At the moment we’ve got Owen [Farrell] and George [Ford], who I believe are the first two flyhalves, and then comes Danny.
“Danny’s probably third or fourth choice and he knows what he’s got to work on, which is between Danny and I.
“He’s disappointed but he understands. He’s desperate to play for England, which is terrific.”
Meanwhile, Gloucester head coach Johan Ackermann praised Cipriani after he won the Player of the Month award.
“Credit to Danny, when he joined us there was a lot of pressure on him from changing clubs and everything, but he has slotted in really well both on the field and off the field,” said Ackermann.
“On the field, it was quite evident that we could see his skill from the first training session. He has got a big belief in his ability in how we can play and he is not shy to try things. I think that suits us, we want to give players that freedom and he has slotted in really well on that.
“It fits quite well because we want our teams to be dominant, we want our teams to be involved between us and the players that want a lot of interaction.”
Cipriani was judged by a panel of experts as the player who made the biggest impact in the Premiership over the month September.
He was involved in a three-way battle to win the award eventually beating Exeter Chiefs’ duo Sam Simmonds and Henry Slade to the title.
Ackermann added: “Danny has that ability to come in and ask questions, share ideas, and I think the players can see that he’s a guy that studies the game and has a very good attention to detail.
“It suits us because as much as we want to play with freedom. The better detail you have, the better for the performance.
“It’s early days, we don’t want to put extra pressure on him, but he must stick to his process, and stick to his game.
“We as a team have still got a lot of improvement to assist him, but it’s early days and it’s up to the team to help Danny.
“The main thing is for him to enjoy being at Gloucester and as a team we keep trying really hard to hopefully help his game as well.
“We are delighted to see a Gloucester Rugby player winning the inaugural Gallagher Premiership Rugby Player of the Month and it’s great to see the new title partner so committed to recognising high performance on the pitch whilst actively supporting local clubs and schools in the local community to get engaged with rugby.”
