Richard Bath is not convinced England are all they cracked up to be under Eddie Jones.
RICHARD BATH IS AN AWARD-WINNING WRITER BASED IN THE UK.
IF YOU READ ALL OF THE LONDON-
centric newspaper online sports sections or standalone rugby websites based in Blighty, you could be forgiven for believing that Eddie Jones’s England side is an unstoppable, runaway truck of a team.
If you believed the hype you’d quickly, inevitably conclude that no one can stand in the way of Eddie’s bloody chariots. But seriously, don’t believe the hype.
That this is a good England team is undoubtedly true. After all, they’re second in the world rankings behind the All Blacks, they’ve won 20 of their 21 games under the hard-nosed stewardship of the Aussie Yoda, and they’ve beaten some pretty handy sides along the way, both home and away.
On the road they won a series 3-0 in Australia and a 2-0 series in Argentina. At home they beat South Africa and won 30-6 as they monstered a Wallaby side fresh from beating the All Blacks.
Oh, and of course they won a Six Nations Grand Slam in Jones’ first year in charge and won the Championship last year.
Sure they haven’t beaten the All Blacks yet, but there’s only one time and place where that one will be settled, and it’s at Twickenham in November, when all of England now expects.
But look under the bonnet and everything’s not quite as straightforward as it seems. Take last year’s Six Nations for example. If you work in broad brushstrokes it is easy to think of that campaign as a straightforward England rumble to the crown, but in reality it was far from that.
They stuffed Italy – hell, the Black Ferns could probably pulp the Azzurri – and pumped Scotland so emphatically that the 61-21 Calcutta Cup car crash defines last year’s tournament for many England and Scotland fans.
But in a year when there was little between five of the six participants in the tournament, their other three games were far from routine.
They needed an inspired 70th minute converted try from former Kiwi Ben Te’o to come from behind and beat France 19-16 at Twickenham on the opening weekend, and it was much the same in their next match in Cardiff where they trailed 16-11 with 10 minutes left and 16-14 with four minutes left, only for Elliott Daly to score a killer try in the corner when Jonathan Davies missed a simple touch.
If those two were near misses, the chickens came home to roost in the final game of the tournament. Going for a Grand Slam, they lost 13-9 in Ireland, as any student of the European game would tell you they might.
England have a habit of choking in the final game when going for a Grand Slam – there’s the famous 1990 winner-takesall Grand Slam match at Murrayfield, of course, but in the last 18 years England have been thwarted on the final weekend when going for a Grand Slam on an
incredible six occasions.
At one stage they lost three final-match Grand Slam showdowns in three successive years, first against Wales, then Scotland, then Ireland.
They’ve only closed the deal twice in that period – when they were World Cup winners in 2003, and then in Jones’s first year in 2016.
History is all in the past, of course, and there are good reasons to think this year could – possibly even should – be different. Every side in the Six Nations has an alternate year when they are more likely to win the Championship, and it’s usually when they have three home games.
But this year England may have two home games, but they are against Wales and Ireland, the two sides who have most consistently thwarted them.
In theory it all looks rosy for Eddie’s men. Italy first up was a sure thing even when the Azzurri were at their best, and those days are long gone. France are in disarray, having sacked coach Guy Noves at the end of December and brought in former Italy coach Jacques Brunel just weeks before the tournament starts.
Scotland have emerged as a real power, but they are vulnerable to sheer power when their opponents want to win first and play rugby second, and Jones has always been first and foremost a winner. As he archly noted after Scotland put 53 points on the Wallabies at Murrayfield in the autumn: “I remember before we played them last year they were being talked up as the best team in Europe, so let’s just wait and see.”
Even England’s two regular nemeses have their issues. Wales have lost several key players – captain Sam Warburton, Lions man of the series Jonathan Davies, iconic wing George North, Lions No 8 Taulupe Faletau and Dan Lydiate are all crook and likely to miss the tournament.
For all their sound and fury, with the exception of that World Cup win over an England side which crumpled under the weight of national expectation, they haven’t won at Twickenham in the Six Nations since 2012, and since then Wales have got worse and England markedly better.
Ireland – who travel to Twickenham on the last day of the Championship in what the organisers clearly hope will be a Grand Slam showdown – may have conquered England at Lansdowne Road last season, but they haven’t won at Twickenham since 2010.
Nor are Ireland a shoo-in to be undefeated by that last game – of the last three matches between Wales and Ireland in Dublin, Wales have won one and drawn another.
Yet if all the auguries are pointing in England’s direction, there are also reasons for caution when it comes to England’s chances, and sensible caveats to the bookies’ overwhelming belief that this is their year [they are an almost unbackable 4/5 to win the tournament].
Take a look at the Champions Cup, for instance, which is the best barometer of the relative strength of the six nations’ playing pools.
At the time of writing, with two of the six pool rounds left to play, the English clubs are doing horrifically. English clubs are bottom of three of the five pools, while Exeter, Saracens and Wasps are third.
Of the seven English sides in the competition, only Bath, who are in a three-way fight with Toulon and Scarlets, stand a realistic chance of winning their pool and progressing to the knockout stages.
Compare that with the French clubs, who top two of the pools, and the two Irish clubs, who both lead their pools. If you want to know how important the relative strengths of the nations’ clubs are, imagine what you’d think of the All Blacks’ chances of world domination if the Kiwi Super Rugby sides were faring as badly as England’s clubs in the Champions Cup.
So sure, England have been revolutionised under Jones, and yes they probably have the biggest pool of talent in Europe and are less dependent upon key individuals than any other Six Nations side.
Yet this incredible old tournament, with its ancient form-defying enmities, has an unerring habit of throwing up major surprises, while the current England players are toiling badly in the only sensible cross-border barometer of form we possess.
So if your money’s on a triumphant English romp to a Grand Slam, you might just want to think again.
Yet if all the auguries are pointing in England’s direction, there are also reasons for caution when it comes to England’s chances, and sensible caveats to the bookies’ overwhelming belief that this is their year [they are an almost unbackable 4/5 to win the tournament].’