>> Probyn: Play Daly and Brown in right positions
“Jones has to take responsibility for the defeats and put players where they usually play”
After the exciting (if shambolic) game last week, it was a case of things could only get better for Eddie Jones and his England squad, but they didn’t. The addition of Joe Launchbury was always going to bring a bit more stability and grunt to the English pack as he seems to allow Maro Itoje the freedom to play more of an open game exploiting his talents in the loose but even that wasn’t enough.
The first start for Brad Shields was as Agustin Pichot said, a sad picture and has taken something from the game no matter how well he did or didn’t play.
A crucial ingredient to playing international rugby is that you must have been to the country your playing for. Personally I would want them to have played as well, but even if you haven’t played a game you should have lived there at least.
Hopefully it won’t happen, but it is possible for Shields to get injured in the last Test or the remainder of the New Zealand season and not come to England, yet he would be an England international and that just seems wrong to me.
The fact that Robshaw was dropped for the match day squad is also a bit of a puzzle as he has been one of the most consistent players for Jones.
Shields had an hour in the first Test to make a difference but showed little of what was expected, while in the second Test where he almost scored, he really didn’t display anything that said he should have replaced Robshaw.
Mind you, the entire team seem to have lost their way and are failing to show even basic skills.
Again England started well and after two smartly taken tries, I was expecting England to cut loose but they went into their collective shell, lost focus and got involved in some ‘handbag waving’ allowing South Africa back.
Eddie said before the start of the tour that only a 3-0 win will do as England sought to rebuild after a disastrous Six Nations, but to be honest the way the team are performing they will be more than lucky to win next week.
Jones has to take responsibility for the defeats, stop the experiments and put players where they usually play, particularly in the backs where Brown and Daly should revert to their usual positions.
Jones once again failed to use his substitutes well despite playing at altitude, as fatigue was certainly partly to blame for the England pack conceding a penalty try because South Africa had brought on a fresh front row.
All in all, Jones has lost the plot somewhere over this last season and he really needs to get it back if this is not to be another tour of hell and England’s World Cup dream is to become a reality.
There are many myths about the 1998 tour of hell as it became known but before a game was played, there was an air of confidence among the coaching staff who reported to club England before the tour that they were excited at the prospect of taking this new group of players and would surprise SANZAR, and had no concerns about the players left at home.
Obviously that all changed after the 76-point disaster in Australia but it was still a worthwhile tour before the 1999 World cup.
England did not play New Zealand very often, outside of World Cups where England have played them twice (1991 and ‘95). It was roughly a tour every six or seven years. That means players can have an entire career with England and never play the All Blacks, which helps build their mystic.
I joined the England squad in late ‘85 and the first time I faced New Zealand was in the opening game of the ‘91 World Cup having been exposed to endless videos saying how good they were, supplied by the RFU to help us copy their training methods.
England played them once at Twickenham in ‘93 and beat them before facing them at Newlands in the ‘95 World Cup where Jonah Lomu took England apart, which lead to Jason Leonard’s famous post match quote while lying on the changing room floor trying to catch his breath, “If we are going to beat these b ***** ds we need to play them more often”.
The RFU took note of the players’ request and their IRB (World Rugby) member, John Jeavons Fellows, set about negotiating a deal to increase England v All Black games, which he finally succeeded in doing a couple of year later with the ‘Tour of hell’ the first time England would face all three Southern Hemisphere rugby giants on a single tour.
It took a lot of behind the scenes work to put the fixtures together and despite the results, England got to play New Zealand on a more regular basis, which was probably one of the main contributing facts to England’s successful 2003 World cup.