Rawlinson ready to make his return (From Worcester News)

Rawlinson ready to make his return

8:00am Wednesday 1st September 2010 in

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INJURED lock Craig Gillies has been ruled out of Worcester Warriors’ Championship trip to Plymouth Albion on Saturday (3pm), but will be replaced by the returning Greg Rawlinson.

However, former All Black Rawlinson, who has not yet featured for Richard Hill, is likely to have to make do with a place on the bench as England Saxon Graham Kitchener will partner Will Bowley in the second row.

Gillies had looked to be recapturing his old form in recent outings — including an impressive 24 minutes against Birmingham and Solihull at Sixways on Saturday — but his participation in the 48-3 victory was curtailed by an ankle ligament problem, which will also rule him out of the game at Brickfields.

Worcester head coach Hill said: “Craig has not got a serious injury but, with the quality of players we’ve got, there’s no need to risk anybody by playing through a slight injury, so we’ve pulled him out for this weekend and Greg will come into the 22.

“Craig has a ligament problem just above the ankle, which is particularly important when you’re pushing in a scrum.”

Plymouth were thrashed 51-3 at Bedford Blues on the opening day, but Hill is expecting the team to come at Warriors like a ‘wounded animal’ this weekend.

He explained: “It was a surprising loss — I wasn’t expec-ting them to lose by that much — and we may well catch them on the rebound.”

Meanwhile, Hill revealed Willie Walker will play fly-half for Warriors in the ‘A’ League Northern Conference clash at Leeds on Monday.

Hill added: “Hopefully, Willie will get a chance to play full-back in the not-too-distant future, but he’s not in the 22 at the moment.”