Jones tells Farrell to leave the referee alone
Coach’s secret plan pays off in superb defeat of France
The most astonishing statistic about Tom Curry, which Eddie Jones reminded us of on Saturday night, is that the openside flanker is just 22.
This is an age at which most players are dipping their toe into the treacherous waters of Test rugby. Curry, though, is merrily swimming lengths of the English Channel. Few thought that his performance in the World Cup semi-final against New Zealand could be bettered, but he set new standards in both the volume and value of his contributions against France on Saturday.
Opta credits him with 33 match involvements, which does not come close to capturing the extraordinary amount of ground that he covered. At the end of a frenetic, fabulous first half he called upon unknown reserves that suggest that he has the lung capacity of a humpback whale.
With France leading 17-13 thanks to dazzling tries from Antoine Dupont and Damian Penaud, they were deep inside the English 22 after a Teddy Thomas break. As France head coach Fabien Galthie ruefully admitted afterwards, a third try then would have completely changed the complexion of the match.
The ball had been in play for 2min 22sec by this point and Curry, who had led the previous kick-chase, swooped to earn a jackal penalty on Mohamed Haouas, and England remained in the contest. Roll forward 40 minutes, and it was Curry who dived on a loose ball to secure the victory and earn coach Jones’s barely-concealed wonderment.
“What I will say is he doesn’t know and I don’t know how good he can be – but we intend to find out,” Jones said. “He continues to impress us as a player that’s developing. He’s still only 22, his body’s still filling out. But he’s become a real leader within our team, he drives the physical standards, drives the standards of the breakdown and he’s only going to keep improving. It’s frightening to think what he’s going to be like by the World Cup.”
Curry’s biggest development since the last World Cup, has been as a ball-carrier. Not everyone followed Jones’s logic when he deployed Curry as a No8 in last year’s Six Nations, but he can now consistently puncture the gain line, making 70 metres off 10 carries. He is very close to becoming the complete package as a modern-day
‘He doesn’t know, and I don’t know, how good he can be – but we intend to find out. He’s only 22’
flanker and it comes as no surprise that he has been studying the greats.
“He watches videos of [Richie] Mccaw and George Smith, who have been the foremost exponents of No7 play in the last 20 years,” Jones said. “But it’s him developing that feel of getting his hands on the ball, wanting to be in the game, rather than fitting into the pattern of an attack. He’s carrying the ball more than he used to. He was very much a pattern player, he fitted into a team pattern and we’re encouraging him to be more a positional player, playing to the ball rather than away from it, which is generally the case for a pattern player.”
Curry was the best player on a pitch full of outstanding performers. France, marshalled by Dupont and Matthieu Jalibert, were close to unplayable in parts of the first half, but England hung on. Anthony Watson continued his rich vein of form scoring by finishing off a period of pressure put in train by a Henry Slade break.
“We had a plan where we thought if we went in at half-time close, we were going to be in a good position,” Jones said. “We just needed to make sure we were close in the last 20, then we wanted to put the accelerator on.” So it proved.
England controlled proceedings with the experience and muchmaligned kicking game of Ben Youngs, George Ford and Owen Farrell coming to the fore. Maybe the fitness of the French told as Maro Itoje burrowed over. Even when Andrew Brace reversed his penalty decision against Ben Earl – “ridiculous” according to Jones – England’s leaders kept their heads.
No8 Billy Vunipola said: “That was the thing I was happiest with today; the way we reacted to setbacks, which were of our own doing. What I felt from [our leaders] was their calmness. We looked to those boys to give us direction and when we knew what we were doing, we were straight into it.”