Dylan Hartley joins The Telegraph h
In the first of his exclusive columns, the former England captain explains why his old side must show no mercy to Georgia in their autumn opener
Georgia have been crying out for this opportunity. If I was England captain this week, I would have been saying: “Let’s send them packing. Let’s show them what this level is really like.”
Would I really mean that? No. I want Georgia to progress and do well. But that message can be a motivator for England: “Be superior, be dominant and show the gulf in class between these two teams.”
I remember a training session against Georgia in the middle of the 2018 Six Nations that left a sour taste. That was the tournament in which Eddie Jones had told me – in confidence – that he was going to push us physically during the campaign.
During down weeks, our counterparts would be going home to see family or having recovery-based training schedules. We were being pushed physically. It was building towards the big picture of the World Cup in 2019 and Eddie wanted to find out more about his players from GPS data, training loads and scheduling. That tournament, in which we ended up coming fifth, was a great experience to learn more about the squad and its limits.
We had beaten Wales 12-6 on the Saturday, the second and last game we won, then on the Tuesday in London we trained against Georgia. They were chomping to be in the Six Nations, and the session started with 40 or 50 live scrums. Then it went into team training. We had guys who were recovering. Some probably had one eye on the next weekend. They were going full-on.
I think Ben Te’o, who got pretty annoyed in the end, dropped a shoulder and levelled someone, to say from our point of view: “Where is the mutual respect in this session?” There wasn’t any, from our point of view.
Of course, I would have been telling my boys to get stuck in if I had been Georgia coach. I am sure Eddie got what he wanted out of the exercise as well. I do remember leaving frustrated because we had effectively played an international game on a Tuesday, which is madness when you are still licking your wounds from the previous weekend.
Today, I feel the pace of the game will be where England dominate. If they make strong carries with good support, creating one-on-one tackles, Georgia will not be able to slow their ruck speed. Then England can play a heads-up game and find space.
Because they will have quick ball, they will not have to rely on structure. Structure can limit you – why should you pass to a pod of three and go out the back when you can zip the ball to a first receiver and play to space? On the other hand, I can imagine Georgia will need some of that structure. And predictability will play into the hands of England’s defence when you think of Maro Itoje, Jack Willis and the rest of their jackal threats.
Georgia will have a purple patch today, so how do England avoid getting dragged into a spiral? The danger as a favourite, when you know you can create try-scoring chances more easily than at other times, is that you force things, look at shiny options to do and throw offloads out of your backside. The key message against anyone – including the All Blacks – should always be: do the basics brilliantly.
If everyone does their job, a performance comes together. If it starts going away from the script, you will see Owen Farrell tighten everyone up and remind them to concentrate on basics: take the ball moving, get good support around the ball. Given good speed of ball, England have the athletes and individuals to find space. People think there is a magic potion, but it is not complicated.
As an England player, games against underdogs are difficult. Frankly, when you play against Italy you have to put 40 or 50 on them. Otherwise people will say: “England were terrible.” If you do score 50, you are expected to do that, so you are not congratulated.
On the surface, all of these teams are very physical up front. Whether you are playing the 20th-ranked team in the world or the No 1, the game is going to hurt you. It is going to physically challenge you because the breakdown, tackles and set-pieces provide opportunities for opponents to be physical.
England will be setting challenges internally and there will be a pressure they put on themselves to perform. The game will not be perfect, but they can control it by being assertive with their game plan. There is no point in scoring 60 but not functioning well at the scrum, for example.
It is almost a statement to themselves about how well they have prepared. I watched them train this week and, jeez, they push themselves. I am sitting there asking: “How did I do that 18 months ago?” If they perform against Georgia, it vindicates how they are training.
The Autumn Nations Cup is a new tournament and Covid-19 has taken away the form-dex in sport. It is almost like you can start writing your own history, so I think England will be out to make a statement to themselves and, more overtly, to the rugby world: “We’re here, we’re doing good things.”
Our live scrums against Georgia in 2018 were full-on – there was no mutual respect there