Hartley blast for coach Jones

Ex-england captain says he was treated like ‘piece of meat’ Former hooker reveals that ‘he’d had enough of Eddie’

Former England captain Dylan Hartley has revealed that Eddie Jones left him feeling like a discarded “piece of meat”, with a “brutal” phone call that ended his international career.

After struggling with a long-term knee injury, Hartley was excluded from England’s squad for the World Cup last year. Denied the chance to add to his 97 caps in Japan, he retired shortly after the tournament.

In his autobiography, The Hurt, and speaking exclusively to today’s

Telegraph Magazine, the 34-yearold says that Jones, the England head coach, confirmed the decision to leave out Hartley with three words: “You’re f----- mate.”

Hartley compared himself to “a piece of meat, thrown in the bin because it was past its sell-by date”.

Although he rates Jones as the best coach he has ever had, and says he was probably right to exclude him from the World Cup squad, he also admits that “I’d had enough of being governed by Eddie”, after three years under the Australian.

Training camps, Hartley says, caused dread among some players. He asked his own family not to visit Pennyhill Park because he thought the atmosphere would resemble a “prison visit”. Hartley’s last game as a professional came on Dec 21, 2018 for Northampton against Worcester. By that stage, sport had become a slog for him.

“It’s not like you’re talking to a kid who didn’t get where he wanted,” Hartley explained. “I got where I wanted and I stayed there a very long time so playing for me in the end was work. If I’m honest, England became just turning up, wanting to get through the game and win so I could have a nice week, an easier week with Eddie.”

Hartley also takes aim at the disciplinary process that cost him 60 weeks over suspensions, stressing that it needs “a hell of a clean-up” and “a more human approach”. In retirement, his body has not fully healed, and he calls for extensive reforms to protect players as the game becomes ever more physical.

“My generation of players have been crash test dummies for a sport in transition from semi-professionalism,” writes Hartley in The Hurt.

“It is being reshaped, subtly, but relentlessly, by money men, geopoliticians, talking heads and television executives. They treat us as warm bodies, human widgets.

“It would be wrong to attempt to skirt the unavoidable truth that as players become bigger, faster and stronger they will be chewed up and spat out quicker.”