Furious England rugby boss Eddie Jones could pull plug on Manu Tuilagi's Test career after boozy session

The Sun
 
Furious England rugby boss Eddie Jones could pull plug on Manu Tuilagi's Test career after boozy session

FURIOUS Eddie Jones could pull the plug on Manu Tuilagi’s Test career after the centre’s latest boozy session.

The pair are understood to have attended a team meal before heading back to their hotel with the rest of the squad and then slipping out to hit the town.

They returned in the early hours yesterday and immediately got their marching orders off Jones.

Their exile meant they missed the only full-on rugby session planned for the three-day get-together.

There is no curfew on the players but 57-year-old Jones is understood to be steaming — and it could impact on the pair’s Test futures.

Tuilagi, 26, has played just 17  minutes for Jones since he took over in December 2015 and been sidelined since January with a knee injury.

Only last week England’s Aussie boss was talking the centre up,  saying he was worth looking after.

But now his future is in doubt and his dream of making the World Cup in Japan 2019 could be over. It is not the first time Tuilagi has shot himself in the foot.

At the 2011 World Cup in New Zealand, he was warned by police and fined £3,000 by the RFU for diving off a ferry into Auckland Harbour the day after England lost to France in the quarter-finals.

His next off-field fracas in May 2015 cost him his World Cup  spot.

Tuilagi admitted assaulting two police officers after a 3am row with a cab driver near Leicester train station and was fined £6,205 by the magistrates.

And he also made a ‘bunny ears’  gesture behind Prime Minister David Cameron’s head at a Downing Street reception to celebrate the Lions’ series win in Australia in 2013.

Danny Care took Tuilagi’s place at the launch of England’s new Canterbury kit yesterday.

Care is no stranger to controversy himself, having been convicted of drink-driving in 2012 and being drunk and disorderly not long after.

The scrum-half, 30, said: “It took me longer to realise that you make one mistake and it’s out
there.“People may not know the full story but they will cast their opinions straight away.

“If I can lend them any advice as an older guy who has been through similar things, I’m there for them.”