Eddie vowing to tough it out
IN DURBAN EDDIE JONES sent Gareth Southgate a good luck message yesterday afternoon from South Africa. He could do with one back.
After five Test defeats on the trot and six in all including the Barbarians knockabout, Jones could do with a visit from the fortune fairy, but the only breaks for him are bad ones at present.
The England coach who could do no wrong four months ago suddenly finds himself on the receiving end of intense criticism and even speculation over his future.
If it is getting him down, you would hardly have known it from his performance in the lobby of the Beverly Hills Hotel in Umhlanga yesterday. The old Tasmanian devil may be in a hole but the experience of 25 years as a globetrotting coach tells him there is a way out.
“Every job is the same. When you are doing well, everyone pats you on the back and when you are not, you’re pulling knives out of your back. That’s the reality of it,” said Jones.
“I’ve been through it before many times. If you coach for a long period of time you have your good periods and your bad periods. These are the periods you look forward to, when everyone thinks you’re done and you have to find a way to win. I’m enjoying it. Loving it. Absolutely loving it.
“When everything is running well, it’s easy. You’ve got your team humming, you’re winning games you shouldn’t. You get 50-50 decisions, you don’t have any injuries.
“The hard parts are when you’ve got injuries, you’re not getting 50-50 decisions, there’s noise around. And that’s where you find your worth and also what players in your team can really stand up to pressure. That’s the most fascinating period.
“Every team I’ve ever been involved with that’s been a champion team goes through this period of time. You have to be able to get through it.
“It’s painful and everyone knows better than you do at that time, but once you get through it, you’ve got the hallmarks of a champion team and that’s where we’re going. I’ve got no doubt about it.”
England’s team psychologist, Dan Abrahams, one of a bloated 30-man support staff with the squad here, is no doubt a busy man at the moment, but Jones is not one of his clients. “I don’t need that,” he said.
It is with the mental side of the game that England have struggled here, their discipline and collective decision-making found wanting. “I couldn’t work with a better team. I am so proud of them. The only criticism I have is we don’t have that emotional control at the right moment. We just need to be composed and do the simple thing well,” said Jones.
Yesterday Jones cited the depth England are building for the World Cup in the absence of players such as Dan Cole and Courtney Lawes, claiming the tour had made him “more positive” about his side’s chances in Japan next year.
It is an elaborate facade. The truth is that the direction of travel, with DYLAN HARTLEY is ready to return to rugby after shaking off the concussion problems that forced him to sit out England’s tour of South Africa.
The England captain, right, has not played since March after picking up a head injury against France during the Six Nations and there were concerns over his future having suffered with concussion previously.
But he has started pre-season training with Northampton and is back in England’s plans.
“I got a text from him this morning. He is progressing well and he is back into full training,” the tournament 14 games away, is alarming. The latest world rankings, issued yesterday, plunged England to No6 with South Africa now above them after their series win.
Jones’s self-assessment is that he is still coaching the team well, whatever the results may say. Others above him at the RFU may hold a more sceptical view.
The pressure is building but the word from inside Twickenham is that he retains the backing of the organisation and its chief executive Steve Brown. “I chat to him said England coach Eddie Jones. “We are happy with what we have here but we will be glad if he is fit and available for selection.”
Saracens No8 Billy Vunipola could miss the start of next season after re-fracturing the arm he initially broke in January during the second Test. He will see a specialist next week to decide if further surgery is needed, having flown home from South Africa. regularly,” said Jones. “I don’t ask for his full support. I do my job. I’m not involved in those decisions.
“The only thing I can do is coach well. Anything else, I don’t control. I just try to coach the team better every day and that’s where my enjoyment comes. That’s what I love doing. I love coaching this team.
“If someone decides that’s not good enough, then they decide. If someone decides I’m good enough then I will keep coaching. That’s what I’ve done with every team I’ve coached and it’s no different now.” The Springboks’ No 8 Duane Vermeulen, man of the match in Bloemfontein on Saturday, has questioned England’s ability to cope without Vunipola in the final Test. “He is definitely England’s go-forward guy and I saw in the Six Nations they struggled without him,” said Vermeulen. “They need that guy.” With the series won, South Africa are set to change half their team for Newlands but have warned England there will be no easing up. “If we can win 3-0 then we want to do that. We would like to go for the three-match clincher,” said Vermeulen, who is set to leave Toulon for Japanese club rugby after the series.
DANNY WILSON has pulled out of a deal to become Wasps’ new forwards coach to take up the same position with Scotland.
Wilson only left his role as head coach at Cardiff Blues in May to join Dai Young in Coventry, leaving the Wasps director of rugby with a hole to fill ahead of the new season. “The timing could not be much worse,” he said.