Jack Maunder currently holds one of the pre-eminent roles in English rugby.
The Exeter scrum-half is the self-effacing link man between try machine Sam Simmonds and the number eight’s elder brother Joe Simmonds, the Chiefs’ captain.
“I feel very lucky to play outside of Sam and inside of Joe,” says Maunder. “It’s probably every nine’s dream at the moment in the Premiership to play as a sandwich in between the Simmonds.”
While the older Simmonds, Sam, has won a British and Irish Lions call-up on the back of a stellar season that has seen him break the Premiership try-scoring record, and younger brother Joe led the Chiefs to a domestic and European double last season, the man between them has flitted under the radar.
“It’s true that the boys have to put him in the right positions,” Maunder says of Sam, who set a Premiership single-season record of 19 tries with three games to play in the Chiefs’ last match against London Irish.
“But Sam has developed into a world-class finisher and there’s reasons why he’s scoring all these tries; it’s because he’s absolutely brilliant at it.
“His power off the mark, his strength, he’s very smart, he knows exactly when to change direction, where to be, and that’s a massive skill.
“It’s not luck that he ends up on all these tries either on the edges or the pick-and-goes, he’s very smart in what he does.”
An England return?
Like the Simmonds brothers, Maunder, 24, has come up through Exeter’s academy ranks.
There is also a family connection – as well as his younger brother Sam, a fellow scrum-half who is also on the Chiefs’ books, father Andy played 149 times for the club, also at nine.
Maunder also has an England cap – a replacement appearance after being called up to England’s 2017 tour of Argentina while the Lions toured New Zealand.
“That Argentina tour is one of my favourite memories ever as a rugby player,” Maunder recalls. “It was awesome and I absolutely loved it.”
So what chance of a similar call-up four years on, having accumulated the experience of starting in successful Premiership and Champions Cup victories?
“That sort of stuff and the rewards come from playing well for Exeter,” he says.
“My job is to try and make the team play as best as they possibly can and get the ball out to our superstars out wide as quickly and as efficiently as possible.”
‘We’re all very good mates’
Maunder knows he needs to be at his best to remain first choice at Exeter with Scotland international Sam Hidalgo-Clyne and fellow homegrown nine Stu Townsend pushing for his place.
While Maunder has largely filled the void left when Australia’s Nic White returned to his homeland, he does not take his place for granted.
“It’s a really tough group, but a very enjoyable group to be a part of,” he added. “We’re all very good mates and I think that helps.
“Our strengths are all probably very different to each other; we all bring something different.
“I’m always trying to learn from Stu bits about his running game. With Sam I’m always trying to see what it was like at different clubs, what sort of training.
“There’s lots of little competitions during the week and we all understand that if you get given that number nine jersey it’s a big responsibility and a big opportunity to play and play well in that shirt.
“We all know there’s someone extremely good and the other nines, if they’re not playing, would be starting for other clubs in the Premiership.”
Article courtesy of BBC Sport
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