England Counties rugby team to tour Belgium

England Counties will continue their tradition of touring and supporting developing rugby nations by travelling to Belgium from Saturday, June 8 until Monday, June 17, reports the RFU’s website. During the week-long tour they will play a Belgian Rugby Federation President’s XV on June 12 in Brussels (at a location yet to be agreed) and the Belgian national team on June 16 in Tubize, Walloon Brabant, and carry out coaching sessions and outreach visits. Counties selection is made during the Bill Beaumont Cup and County Championship and the squad will be announced following this weekend’s final round of group games. Team manager Michael Old said: “There have been some very competitive games in this year’s championship and many standout performances. We can already see that final selection is going to be tough, which bodes well for the strength of the tour squad.” Since their first tour to Chile in 2002 the England Counties XV have visited Canada, Uruguay, Russia, the US, South Korea and Japan, and last year made a ground-breaking trip to east Africa. European tours have included France, Spain and Romania.