World Cup winner Jonny Wilkinson has been dropped by England for the Six Nations clash with Ireland on Saturday, with Danny Cipriani taking his place at fly-half.

It is only the second time Wilkinson (pictured) has been dropped in his 69-cap career and his relegation to the bench is the only change to the starting XV that lost 15-9 to Scotland last weekend.

Rising star Cipriani, 20, was due to make his debut against the Scots but was withdrawn from the squad for disciplinary reasons after visiting a London night club three days before the match.

Wilkinson, England's first-choice at stand-off for the last 10 years, takes over from Sale's Charlie Hodgson on the substitutes' bench for the final weekend of the Six Nations.

The one other change to head coach Brian Ashton's 22-man squad sees fit-again Wasps flanker James Haskell return to the bench after recovering from a leg injury.

Haskell takes the place of Gloucester back-rower Luke Narraway.

Wilkinson's omission from the starting line-up comes as no surprise following what was by far his worst game in an England jersey against the Scots.

Since returning last summer from several seasons blighted by injury, Wilkinson has struggled to launch England's backline and his crabbing footwork and deep standing have drawn criticism from many quarters.

Even though Wilkinson played a major role in England's route to the World Cup final last year, with his usual fearless defence and accurate goal kicking, England's backs have failed to fire while he has been in the play-maker role.

His England form reached a nadir at Murrayfield last weekend when he produced a directionless performance peppered with woeful kicking from hand that made it almost inevitable that he would be dropped.

Ironically, the first of his three penalties at Murrayfield saw him take over from Welshman' Neil Jenkins as the all-time leading Test points scorer.

But Cipriani has been the form fly-half in the Premiership this season and the highly-talented Wasps player now has the chance to show what he can do at the highest level.

The biggest surprise is that Ashton has not made more changes since England's dire display in Edinburgh clearly showed they had made no progress during his time in charge.

Code convert Lesley Vainikolo has kept his spot on the left wing despite fumbling almost every ball he received at Murrayfield, while Wilkinson's Newcastle team-mate Toby Flood is also fortunate to stay at inside centre.

With the Six Nations title beyond England's reach, and only pride to play for, many were expecting Ashton to use the chance to add more creativity to his side and blood a series of younger players.

But Ashton has developed a reputation for being highly-conservative and too loyal in his selections and his line-up for the Ireland game remains in that mould.

Gloucester back James Simpson-Daniel, one of the Premiership's most exciting runners, was expected at least to make the squad, while prop Matthew Stevens and hooker George Chuter can consider themselves unlucky not to have been promoted from the bench.

It is also a surprise that Haskell has not returned to the starting line-up as he was arguably England's best player in the games with Wales and Italy, before leaving the field injured against France.

England: 15-Iain Balshaw,14-Paul Sackey, 13-Jamie Noon, 12-Toby Flood, 11-Lesley Vainikolo, 10-Danny Cipriani, 9-Richard Wigglesworth; 8-Nick Easter, 7-Michael Lipman, 6-Tom Croft, 5-Steve Borthwick, 4-Simon Shaw, 3-Phil Vickery (capt), 2-Lee Mears, 1-Andrew Sheridan.

Replacements: 16-George Chuter, 17-Matt Stevens, 18-Ben Kay, 19-James Haskell, 20-Paul Hodgson, 21-Mathew Tait, 22-Jonny Wilkinson.

Terence O'Rorke / Eurosport