Wallabies won’t beat us like this, insists Jones
EDDIE Jones suffered his heaviest defeat as England head coach as his side were comfortably beaten by 14-man Barbarians in their final game before touring Australia this summer.
In England’s first match since going down 25-13 to France in March, their third defeat of the Six Nations, they were again beaten by a coaching team of Fabien Galthié and Shaun Edwards.
The Barbarians plundered eight tries despite Will Skelton receiving a red card close to the halfhour mark for a dangerous tackle on Patrick Schickerling.
Despite the embarrassing loss, Jones vowed that England would not be on the receiving end of similar scorelines over a three-Test series against the Wallabies.
“No-one is happy about it but again we look at it in the light of what we’re trying to do,” he said. “There’s a contextual situation here. We’re trying to build a new team, play a different way, a style that suits our players and there are going to be some ups and downs.”
England started brightly as Marcus Smith got his hands on the ball early and tried to dictate the tempo of the game.
The Harlequins fly-half opened the scoring from one of his only two successful kicks from the tee and failed to convert any of England’s three tries but his kicking from hand was precise and he had a hand in both Joe Cokanasiga’s and Jonny May’s touchdowns before scoring the third himself.
Unlike previous BaaBaas sides that contained players from over the world, this team had a very French feel, with nearly all of the players from the Top 14.
As a result, they were slick and well-drilled, making nine visits into the England 22 as they racked up more than 50 points.
A penalty try for Jonny May’s deliberate knock-on was followed by a powerful surge over the line by Charles Ollivon, before Mark Atkinson’s first start for England took an unfortunate turn as he threw the ball straight to Damian Penaud for an easy run-in for the first of his two tries.
The Baa-Baas appeared fresher and better organised as they turned defence into attack on more than one occasion.
Their own replacement scrum-half Nolann le Garrec lofted a kick over the top of the scattered England defence for Louis Carbonel to gather and score the pick of five second-half tries under the posts.
Carbonel collected a chip from Antoine Hastoy after sustained Baa-Baas pressure, before he provided his own chip for Max Spring, who capped a length-of-the-field breakaway to secure the victory.
England’s humiliation was complete as Hastoy ran in under the posts to give George Kruis a third conversion shot, which he duly took having sent over the previous one with a back-heel.