How Marcus Smith’s rise to superstardom came crashing down ...Middle East

It’s been a fun ride on board the Marcus Smith express these last few years.

I bought my ticket in support of the Harlequins fly-half during the Covid-benighted season of 2020-21 when his attitude to attack, and an inspirational ability to see the rugby wood for its trees, were combined with Quins jinking and smiling and surging to the Premiership title.

Now the Marcus express has been shunted into a siding – not for the first time, as we shall see – and Smith has been dropped to the England bench for this Sunday’s Six Nations home match with Italy.

Do we conclude the journey has run its course, and even weep for the misuse of a mighty talent? Or has Smith been given enough chances and, anyway, are there fresh twists of the rollercoaster to come?

Some have drawn a parallel with Danny Cipriani, the gifted fly-half who had 16 caps for England and never had a sustained run.

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It feels like a false equivalence as Smith is on 42 caps and counting, plus there are voices behind the scenes with England cautioning not to write his Test obituary yet.

England A fly-half Charlie Atkinson and Bath’s Orlando Bailey are seen as nothing like the equal of Smith or his namesake, Fin of Northampton Saints, who has the No 10 jersey and the favour of Steve Borthwick right now.

Back in the summer of ’21, when Smith at the age of 22 lifted the league trophy at Twickenham, he also made his debut for England, and he was whistled up for the Lions tour in South Africa, all bright-eyed and floppy-haired, for some bit-part provincial appearances.

Fast forward to the current Six Nations, and he was already subjected to a lack of confidence by starting the last two matches at full-back, a position for which his talents are not best suited.

Could England have done more under Borthwick or his predecessor Eddie Jones to fashion a team to suit Smith, perhaps to the extent of installing a Harlequins-style team around him?

As recently as last March the England bench had five Quins on it, with Smith, Joe Marler, Chandler Cunningham-South, Alex Dombrandt and Danny Care.

But England have never possessed a big, ball-playing No 12 like Andre Esterhuizen, the South African who gave Harlequins the skills of both bludgeon and rapier, and was therefore a perfect complement to the flashing blade, Smith.

For whatever reason, that intuitive smoothness in understanding – the kind Borthwick says he is hoping for in picking five Northampton backs this week – has rarely been seen.

Looking through Smith’s England career, 17 of his first 18 caps were at No 10, some with Owen Farrell forced in alongside at No 12 in a partnership that did not click.

Under Borthwick his place has been much less certain. In a sequence of 14 appearances in 2023 and 2024 – encompassing the World Cup in France followed by an injury at the start of last year’s Six Nations – Smith had two at fly-half, three at full-back, and nine off the bench.

You could ask Richie Mo’unga, Damian McKenzie and Beauden Barrett of New Zealand what the phrase “first-choice fly-half” means after their similar wrangles and shifting around with the All Blacks in recent times.

But it was clearly not the description for Smith under the coaching of the often safety-first former second row.

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There seemed to be an upward lurch of the Marcus rollercoaster when he started at 10 on last year’s summer tour and stayed there in the autumn, but Borthwick had already expressed glowing praise for Fin Smith and his part in Northampton winning the 2024 Premiership title (an interesting parallel in itself).

In the current Six Nations, it’s been Marcus moved around again, in jersey numbers 10, 15, 15 and now 23.

Given that very few players in history are undroppable – think Antoine Dupont or Martin Johnson, and not even Jonny Wilkinson during all his England fly-half years, although he was in the middle period Smith is going through now – it may be futile to look for lessons in all this.

But the Twickenham crowd’s reaction to Smith the substitute on Sunday will be instructive, as they booed when he was taken off in the November defeat by New Zealand, which also featured a typical moment of individualistic brilliance on the break to create England’s only try.

And then there is Smith’s persona within the England set-up. He was accorded a role of style icon in the Netflix documentary of last year’s Six Nations, oohing and aahing over a pricy Mercedes.

His representatives at the Roc Nation agency told Planet Rugby in January they planned to take Smith to the USA to “make him more relevant outside of the rugby world”, with PR tactics similar to Real Madrid footballer Vinicius Jr and South African rugby star Siya Kolisi, popping up in the front row at NBA games.

It’s not known if Borthwick frowned at any of this, but during England’s training camp in York last week, there was a tiny hint at a thumbing of the nose at Smith’s view of where he should be.

“We have all seen the reports how he loves playing 10,” England assistant coach Kevin Sinfield said. “He is an outstanding 10 but I think he is a very, very good 15 as well.”

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Sinfield elaborated: “You look at how the game is played now and how valuable a second ball-player can be. Marcus’ big strengths are when he is in space. He is able to move laterally very, very quickly, so he puts defenders under a lot of stress.

“So clearly it makes sense to try and get him a little bit wider where the gaps tend to be a little bit bigger. If we could get him into a position where he’s world class at both [fly-half and full-back], it gives us some options. He could end up being a third ball-player at some stage.”

Anything could yet happen this Sunday. With centre Henry Slade left out entirely by England, and remembering Smith’s shaky positional kicking from full-back in the 16-15 win over Scotland, they have recalled the left-footed Elliot Daly.

Borthwick on Wednesday also bemoaned an inability to seize on attacking chances such as quick line-outs against the Scots, which is mystifying if it was a dig at Smith, whose game is if anything too much about that kind of spark.

As for whether or not this harms Smith’s chances of selection for this summer’s Lions tour, it surely is a red-shirt herring. It may well be a bad sign for him, but England can’t select a player to make sure he plays for a different team.

If he is good enough to go to Australia, he’ll go. If he is with England in Argentina instead, he can lead the way there. Only if Smith is missing from that trip, or plays second fiddle to George Ford or Atkinson or Bailey, will we know for sure the winds of change have blown him away for good.

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