George happy to prove England’s old guard still have plenty more to offer

When Jamie George was dropped from England’s squad for the autumn internationals, he told Eddie Jones that he was going to prove him wrong. “That was part of the motivation,” the Saracens hooker said. “It was nice to do that.”

Even if the England head coach has little appetite for consuming humble pie, he will be delighted by the reaction to his seismic decision to jettison George – who came back into the fold after Luke Cowandickie’s injury – along with George Ford and the Vunipola brothers. This came with a pointed warning to the rest of his seasoned campaigners about whether they had “the will to win” to prepare for a third World Cup cycle.

Even without losing his temper, Jones’s message has been heard loud and clear. As much as this autumn campaign was billed as a youthful reset, it was the old guard who shone brightest under the lights at Twickenham on Saturday, not withstanding the cameo of golden boy Marcus Smith.

The thirtysomething brigade of George, Jonny May and Ben Youngs registered two tries each. Manu Tuilagi and Henry Slade – who are both looking to play in their third World Cup – demonstrated again why they are the most complementary centre pairing England have possessed since 2003.

Standing in as captain, Courtney Lawes was outstanding and delivered the highlight of the match with his lung-busting cover tackle on Telusa Veainu. “You look at the effort of Courtney chasing back when Veainu made the intercept, to stop that try,” Jones said. “That is a really selfless act and that is the sort of thing you want to see from those players that maybe have done a lot of things in their career and want to work really hard for the team.”

Let us get all the disclaimers out of the way. This was an understrength Tonga team who had shipped 60 points to Scotland last week and lost 102-0 to New Zealand in the summer. They played more than half the game with 14 men after two were sent to the sin-bin and Viliami Fine’s idiotic red card.

One could rightly say: “If you don’t look good against these guys...” but then England have frequently looked stodgy rather than sensational against tier-two opposition.

At the very least, no one took a backward step against Tonga, with youngsters Freddie Steward at fullback and wing Adam Radwan also