THE summer tour of New Zealand was one to forget for England and Mike Brown but former Red Rose coach Brian Ashton is convinced the full-back has what it takes to conquer the All Blacks on Saturday.

Last season could hardly have gone any better for Southampton-born Brown, who was voted player of the Six Nations before earning a similar gong for Harlequins in the Aviva Premiership.

A historic series win over the All Blacks would have been the perfect way to top it all off but former Peter Symonds student Brown was named in each starting XV as England slumped to a 3-0 series defeat.

England did start brightly, succumbing to a last-gasp try in the first Test while Brown got his name on the scoresheet the week after in another narrow loss in Dunedin.

The 29-year-old now has the chance to help exact revenge in the first of the 2014 QBE Internationals at Twickenham, and Ashton believes he’ll have gotten wise to the world champions’ game.

“As an athlete you don’t want to be peaking too early but he had a fantastic Six Nations this year, although he was slightly less good against New Zealand in the summer,” he said. “Maybe it was down to fatigue but New Zealand are a different prospect.

“But now he has the familiarity of playing the best attacking kicking game in the world, and he’s a resilient character who will be full of confidence despite that tour.

“He has a lot of ability and now he’ll be looking to push on against the very best.

“Maybe he wasn’t at his best in the summer, but he was in the team when New Zealand were well beaten by England in the autumn internationals two years ago so that blows the argument out of the water that he can’t do it against the best.”

Ashton, who coached England between 2006 and 2008, has himself played a part in preparations for the QBE Internationals after offering advice to Stuart Lancaster and his coaching staff.

But even though Brown has hauled in a number of accolades over the last calendar year, Ashton warns that no player can consider himself a sure-fire bet as a Red Rose starter.

“It’ll be an interesting autumn because anything can happen in 12 months and no one is guaranteed their starting place – not even the captain Chris Robshaw.

“The great thing for England is that they have a lot of strength in depth, it’s a good position to be in before a World Cup.”

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