Newcastle Falcons full-back Ben Redshaw starts for England Under-20s on Friday when they travel to Italy in Six Nations action.

Club-mates Jacob Oliver, Oliver Spencer and Ben Douglas are all on the bench for the 7.15pm UK-time kick-off at Treviso’s Stadio Comunale di Monigo, which is being shown live on the BBC iPlayer.

England Under-20s head coach Mark Mapletoft said: “It’s great to be back in a game week with the boys, the team are incredibly excited for Friday’s test against a very challenging Italian side.

“Over the past week, we’ve challenged the team to push themselves in a highly competitive environment as well as seeking to emulate our core principles of speed, attachment and space.”

The U20s have accelerated preparations for the Six Nations tournament in recent weeks with fixtures against Bath United and Oxford University, missing out in a 33-42 score-line in the former and emerging victors in the latter, finishing 44-5 against the university outfit.

ENGLAND UNDER-20S TEAM V ITALY

15 Ben Redshaw (Newcastle Falcons)

14 Toby Cousins (Northampton Saints)

13 Ben Waghorn (Harlequins)

12 Sean Kerr (Harlequins)

11 Alex Wills (Sale Sharks)

10 Rory Taylor (Gloucester Rugby)

9 Archie McParland (Northampton Saints)

1 Asher Opoku-Fordjour (Sale Sharks)

2 Craig Wright (Northampton Saints)

3 Billy Sela (Bath Rugby)

4 Olamide Sodeke (Saracens)

5 Junior Kpoku (Racing 92)

6 Finn Carnduff (captain, Leicester Tigers)

7 Henry Pollock (Northampton Saints)

8 Zach Carr (Harlequins)

Replacements

16 Jacob Oliver (Newcastle Falcons)

17 Scott Kirk (Bath Rugby)

18 James Halliwell (Bristol Bears)

19 Joe Bailey (Exeter Chiefs)

20 Nathan Michelow (Saracens)

21 Ben Douglas (Newcastle Falcons)

22 Josh Bellamy (Harlequins)

23 Ollie Spencer (Newcastle Falcons)

ENGLAND UNDER-20S FIXTURES

February 2 – Italy v England – 19:15 – Stadio Monigo, Treviso.

February 9 – England v Wales – 19:15 – The Recreation Ground, Bath.

February 23 – Scotland v England – 19:15 – Hive Stadium, Edinburgh.

March 8 – England v Ireland – 19:15 – The Recreation Ground, Bath.

March 15 – France v England – 20:00 – Stade du Hameau, Pau.