Eddie: I couldn’t resist a return

FOR Eddie Jones, the cleansing process took place at a CrossFit camp with his wife, Hiroko, on the island of Okinawa in the Pacific Ocean.

He allowed himself seven days off after England’s World Cup final defeat, before returning to his office at Twickenham for round two.

It would have been easy to walk away. Jones could have stayed in Japan and cashed in as a club coach but he could not resist a second bite.

It all starts again in Paris today, where England take their first steps towards healing the wounds inflicted by South Africa three months ago.

‘You go through a grieving period,’ said Jones. ‘Clive Woodward locked himself in a room for three days. My wife would kick me out of bed. We did CrossFit three times a day — twice in the morning, once at night.

‘I enjoyed a class called Thrusters… you don’t have to think, you just get in there and rip in. It was a bit of a cleansing, then I came back and was ready to go. I loved being a 60-year-old competing against 40-year-olds… seeing if I can beat them.’

Time will tell if he is older and wiser. His message has been about peaking at World Cups but Jones Mk2 is interested in the here and now.

He has kept together the bulk of the squad from Japan and hopes a few significant tweaks will make the difference when they begin their Six Nations bid against a France team who had to make a late change to their XV after winger Damian Penaud was ruled out yesterday with a calf injury, with Vincent Rattez his likely replacement.

Matt Proudfoot and Simon Amor have joined his coaching team, while he has addressed problems at the scrum and full-back by selecting Joe Marler and George Furbank today. Evolution, rather than revolution. Jones’ contract expires next year but if his tuning exercise is successful then he could well stay on until 2023.

‘The only reason I’m continuing is because I think this team can improve,’ said Jones. ‘The RFU only want me to continue if they think I can improve the team. The contract is important from a legal point of view but they want to win and I want to win. I was only ever going to continue if I thought I could keep improving the team.

‘I heard Pep Guardiola talking about whether he’s going to re-sign at Man City. The players tell you whether you should continue. It’s a bit like that for me. If the team’s indifferent then maybe they need a change.

‘I coach because I love the game. I want to make a team that’s worthwhile watching. That’s the great thing about rugby: you see players grow. We’ve got a squad that’s already good but they’re young enough to grow. Then we bring these 10 young guys in — Alex Moon, Will Stuart, George Furbank, Ted Hill — who have all got their careers ahead of them.

‘I want those guys to have an opportunity to be as good as they can. Over the next period of time we can become the best team ever… that’s the exciting bit.’