Wounded Boks are at their most dangerous, Jones warns his men

Players have to get mindset right from start, says coach May in line to play first Test since last year’s World Cup

It must come to an end. It is 12 long games since England beat South Africa, at Twickenham in 2006, but the home side have done so well in the past year and the visitors are in such a mess in all respects, from their structure back home, their recent record of four Test losses from five, their quota-affected selection to their tactical confusion, that there seems only one result possible in London on Saturday. England will win.

But that does not mean that they – and indeed we as observers — should not prepare for a truly brutal battle. Few teams can summon such car-crash physicality and ferocity as South Africa, especially when in adversity. It is embedded in their national rugby psyche.

It will not become as disgracefully violent as in 2002, when lock Jannes Labuschagne was sent off early after a horrible late tackle on Jonny Wilkinson and any number of South Africans could, and probably should, have followed him for a succession of cheap shots as they lost 53-3, but you can fully expect the South Africans to ratchet up the jaw-dropping hit levels as far as the ever-seeing eyes of modern technology and citing officers will permit.

Victory over England can cure all manner of evils for any side. That was what South Africa were attempting in 2002 after defeats by France and Scotland, and it should also be recalled that in 2006, the weekend after that last victory, England promptly lost to the same opponents at the same venue. Having lost seven of their previous nine Tests, it saved South Africa’s year.

Interestingly the current South Afri- can head coach, Allister Coetzee, was an assistant to Jake White on that tour, and it actually preceded a run of 13 con- secutive victories in 2007/08, including winning the Rugby World Cup, with none other than Eddie Jones as an assistant alongside Coetzee.

“He is a terrific fella,” says Jones of Coetzee. “When I joined the team in 2007 he was the backs coach, so we worked very closely together. He has a sharp rugby brain and is very good with people. He is also the sort of guy that can absorb that pressure that has been on him at the moment.” And so Jones also understands as well as most the mentality of a South African player.

“Imagine if you’re a Springbok player now,” he says. “You’re going to be copping it from every single conceivable place: the media, fans and friends.

“But they also know their one chance for redemption for the whole year is beating England. If they beat England, then they go home as heroes. They will have a certain amount of desperation and you will see how desire changes performance. Look at the performance of Munster the other week. South Africa are almost at the moment where they are at the point of no return.”

Jones knows what is coming. “At the end of the day it comes down to our players’ mindset,” he says. “We know what we are going to get from South Africa. They have had a terrible year and they are going to come to Twickenham with enormous desire, so we have to be able to meet that.”

As Billy Vunipola says: “They are a very straightforward team. They have got big, big players, they are skilful and they are quick and they play a certain type of rugby that, if you don’t front up, you are going to get beaten. Eddie said they like to try and break teams down by playing on top of them. You have got to stand up to that.” Not that Vunipola or his brother Mako will mind that, as two of England’s more physical men.

“I would rather someone ran at me than ran round me – if that is what you are asking,” he says with a smile.

The two Vunipolas will be inked onto the England teamsheet for next weekend, as will be many others, but there are still some interesting selection calls to be made. Second-guessing Jones is never easy, particularly now with so many injury concerns, but you would think that the backline selection is fairly straightforward.

Yes, wings Anthony Watson and Jack Nowell are crocked, but surely Jonny May will return after long-term injury on his favoured left wing and Semesa Rokoduguni will begin to add to his one cap against New Zealand in 2014 on the right wing, where his left-handed fends and general excellence have been very much in evidence for Bath this season.

Marland Yarde, another player best suited to the right, will, of course, challenge Rokoduguni strongly.

It seems that Rokoduguni struggled with the concomitant attention of international rugby more than the rugby itself back then, but he is now better equipped as a person and player.

May’s last Test was the Australia debacle at the Rugby World Cup that sent England out of their own party, having only just returned to club action at Gloucester after injuring his knee last December.

“I did my ACL [anterior cruciate ligament] against Harlequins, but I was playing with a knee with other ligaments that weren’t fully right,” he says. “So I had a couple fixed and my ACL reconstructed. I had a fair bit of work done.” Crucially for May, though, and as a good indicator of his worth, Jones kept in touch throughout his long rehabilitation.

“What surprised me was that he kept in contact with me, which was huge for me,” May says. “Just to be in Eddie’s thoughts I thought, ‘I have got to get this right and get back in there.’” May has done that and it will be a surprise if he is not named in the side on Thursday, so too George Ford at 10 and Owen Farrell at 12, even if you can imagine Jones thinking seriously about Ben Te’o’s power at 12, just as he did before the first Test against Australia last summer before plumping, wrongly as he admitted, for Luther Burrell.

Up front so much will depend on the fitness of Courtney Lawes. If he is fit, then he pairs up with Joe Launchbury and there is not too much concern about the line-out, even if it is fairly well known that Lawes is not a student of that part of the game like George Kruis and Maro Itoje are.

If Lawes is unfit, I would simply pick Dave Attwood there, and forget about the fact that he and Launchbury are both heavy-duty front-of-the-line men.

I can see why Tom Wood might be a contender at seven because of the lineout options, but again I would be inclined to stick to the original plan, whether that was Teimana Harrison or Nathan Hughes at seven.

England seemed to create a world of problems for themselves in other areas at the Rugby World Cup last year, simply because of worries about the line-out.

Dylan Hartley is a good thrower — as is Jamie George — and plans and ploys can be made.

Personally I would go with Hughes — who apparently impressed hugely during training in Portugal last week — for the same reason that Launchbury and Attwood should be paired: the talk of brutality with which we began this piece.

This is going to be a titanic physical battle. The Gloucester wing has spent nine months out injured and his last Test was against Australia in the Rugby World Cup. It is his first experience of the Eddie Jones camp and he will want to bring the sort of form that brought that wonder try against New Zealand in 2014. The Fijian-born wing and Army tank-driver won a solitary cap against New Zealand in 2014 but struggled to cope with the occasion and faded from prominence. But he has been in superb form for Bath this season, with his excellent work in the air and dazzling footwork.

‘Springbok players know their one chance of redemption for the whole year is beating England’