England Counties ring the changes
June 12, 2003

England Counties have made four changes to their starting line-up for Saturday's clash with Romania.

Orrell prop Martin O'Keefe, Otley lock Jason Oakes, Birmingham scrum half Paul Knight and Sale utility-back James Moore are the fresh faces in the side following the 26-24 win against Romania A on Tuesday.

Coach Bob Hood explained: "We had to make difficult choices and there was a very thin dividing line in some of the positions.

"Now we've got a better idea of what to expect and what we need to do and we've picked players to do those jobs.

"Romania A was a perfect game for us: we had a tough time, we got to look at all our replacements and we won the match.

"But we were nowhere near our full potential and it was a good learning curve for us. Now we're fine-tuning and if we put it all together we'll give Romania a good test."

O'Keefe moves to an unfamiliar tight-head role to take on a powerful Romanian pack and 6ft 8in Otley lock Oakes replaces Sedgley Park's Paul Arnold in the second row.

The older of the two Knight brothers is preferred to Andy Brown at scrum half while Moore is rewarded for his coolness under pressure in securing Tuesday's victory in Constanta.

The 20-year-old came on as a replacement to stroke over two conversions and a penalty as the Counties recovered from a 17-9 deficit and will be the first-choice kicker at the National Stadium in Bucharest.

Fly half Pete Murphy recovering from a knee injury and if he fails to come through a final training session Rob Hitchmough will move up to stand-off with David Knight standing by to take over at full back.

Team: Hitchmough (Lancashire), Moore (Cheshire), Cooper (Cheshire), Bonney (Middlesex), Kirkby (Yorkshire), Murphy (Cumbria), Knight (Gloucestershire), Windo (capt, Gloucestershire), Armstrong (Cumbria), O'Keefe (Lancashire), Oakes (Northumberland), Soper (Cornwall), Rossigneux (Middlesex), Bland (Cumbria), Wilson (Yorkshire).

Replacements: Sigley (North Midlands), Price (Gloucestershire), Arnold (Lancashire), Muckalt (Lancashire), Brady (Warwickshire), Brown (Yorkshire), Swords (Middlesex).

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