Lane banks on piggyback from Jarrod to earn recall

PREVIEW…

Blues v Benetton

Mon, Nov 16. Kick-off 19.45pm, Rodney Parade

Challenge: Owen Lane is fighting for Test chance

OWEN Lane hopes playing outside maverick fly-half Jarrod Evans can help fire him back into the squad. The Blues wing has not appeared for his country since winning his second cap against in the bronze medal match at last year's . But he is determined to find his way back into 's plans and believes teammate Evans can help him achieve his goal.

“My aspiration is to get back in the Wales squad and play for Wales again,” the 22-year-old Lane said. “Hopefully playing with the likes of Jarrod will help me do that. Everyone knows Jarrod is exceptionally talented and I love seeing him playing so well. “I don't need to think about what I need to do. I just need to look for him and try to get on his shoulder.

“He's bound to make a line break or two and create some opportunities. Hopefully he'll be able to find me and I'll be able to pick up a few tries off the back of it.” The Blues started the weekend second in Conference B of the PRO14 but have lost their last three games after a promising start to the season.

John Mulvihill's side host Benetton in tomorrow and Lane is confident they can get back to winning ways after last week's defeat to .

He said: “We've got a really good back-line and we do play an exciting style of rugby. Last week we probably went away from that and tried to play Edinburgh at their own game.

“We've focused on ourselves this week and Benetton gives us an opportunity to do that.” Lane enjoyed a whirlwind 2019 where he experienced the elation of a first Wales cap before ankle and shoulder injuries derailed his progress. The explosive wing is confident he is back on track. He said: “It's well documented that in our game the highs are really high and the lows are quite low. It's very frustrating as a player because I feel like I'm doing everything I can to try and stay fit and healthy to put a string of games together and at the wrong time my body fails me.

“But I'm trying to remain as positive as possible. I'd be lying if I said it hasn't been challenging mentally off the field, but I'm lucky we've got a really good medical team here and I feel as if I'm back on track.