KIDOLOGY?

Jones names eight rookies and claims England have been written off.. but bookies beg to differ!

EDDIE JONES billed England as Six Nations ‘no-hopers’ – then warned his men would relish the underdog tag.

Injury and suspension has robbed him of 13 star names, like Billy Vunipola, Elliot Daly, Joe Marler and James Haskell.

He has been forced into picking eight rookies and, with English clubs toiling in Europe and both Ireland and Scotland heading into the tournament on a high, the heat is very much on.

Jones, the master of the mind game, responded last night by manufacturing a siege mentality. “I’m excited by our prospects of doing well, particularly as we’ve been written off,” he said, ignoring the fact England are odds-on favourites to complete an historic hat-trick of titles.

“No one thinks we can win the Six Nations so we have an opportunity to hunt the other teams down.

“Ireland are dominating European rugby, their provincial sides are going well, their national side has had great success. They have this central contracting system that allows them to have their players at their peak. And we’ve got 13 players out. “So we’ve got no hope. If you read the papers, we might as well not turn up. But we have a good enough squad which will maximise the ability we have to win the Six Nations.” Jones claims to have worked through 25 different squad permutations before finally settling on this group to prepare for Italy on Saturday fortnight. He knows he will be down to his sixth or seventh-choice loosehead prop on the bench in Rome and that No.8 Zach Mercer (left) will likely get his first cap.

Jones is resigned to not picking Manu Tuilagi as he lacks sharpness. He is aware Mike Brown, Chris Robshaw and Ben Te’o are carrying knocks and said Marcus Smith is not an option because he spends too much time “running sideways”.

And Jones added: “You can only put 15 players on the pitch and they have got to play with heart, passion and pride.”