Owen Farrell may miss England's tour of Australia as key players rested

England head coach Eddie Jones was at Saracens to see the 36-18 win over Exeter Chiefs

Saracens and England fly-half Owen Farrell (Getty Images)

Saracens’ Grand Slam-winning fly-half Owen Farrell may miss some or all of this summer’s England tour of Australia, as speculation began that the newly-crowned Six Nations champions will give a number of key players a rest from the trip.

England head coach Eddie Jones was at Saracens on Saturday to see the Premiership leaders’ 36-18 win over fellow European Cup quarter-finalists Exeter Chiefs, with man-of-the-match Farrell scoring 14 points including a fine try made by Schalk Brits and Billy Vunipola.

The Exeter No 8 Thomas Waldrom rumbled over for two tries to take his chart-leading total in the Premiership to 10 but his team were well beaten.

While Jones will certainly not take a drastically-weakened squad to his Australian homeland, the former England lock Ben Kay suggested in his television commentary that Farrell and Bath’s England No 10 George Ford might be given “time off” in June, with the recently fit-again midfielders Manu Tuilagi and Henry Slade more needful of game tmie in the three Tests down under.

“I’ve got to get picked [for the tour] first,” said Farrell. “Everyone is fresh [at Saracens] because it’s a different environment [from England] and you freshen up coming back into different environments. You don’t feel like you have to pull yourself out of bed to get up for a game against Exeter.”