Maro Itoje heads a list of England players snubbed by World Rugby for its player of the year award despite their march to the World Cup final. Tom Curry is the only member of Eddie Jones’s squad on the six-man shortlist and while the 21-year-old would become the youngest ever recipient of the award, a number of his team-mates are notable by their absence. Itoje was named man of the match for his performance against New Zealand in last weekend’s World Cup semi-final and has been among the standout performances throughout the tournament. Like a host of other England players, including Owen Farrell, George Ford, Kyle Sinckler and Manu Tuilagi, he can consider himself unfortunate to be overlooked for the prestigious award, however. England’s opponents in Saturday’s final have two representatives on the shortlist with the flying winger Cheslin Kolbe joined by Pieter-Steph du Toit, having also played a key role in claiming the Rugby Championship title for South Africa. Alun Wyn Jones, who captained Wales to the Six Nations grand slam and World Cup semi-final, the All Black flanker Ardie Savea and the USA’s Joe Taufete’e who earlier this year became the most prolific try-scoring front-row forward in history,…