World Cup-winning Proudfoot joins England setup

ENGLAND head coach Eddie Jones has appointed Matt Proudfoot and Simon Amor as his new assistant coaches ahead of this year’s Six Nations tournament, the Rugby Football Union (RFU) said yesterday.

Proudfoot, a former Scotland international who helped the Springboks win the World Cup last year before his contract as assistant coach ended, will replace Steve Borthwick as England’s forward coach, with the latter becoming the skills coach.

Amor, who was head coach of the England men’s Sevens and the Great Britain Sevens which won silver at the Rio Olympics in 2016, comes in as attack coach.

“The Six Nations 2020 is a fresh start for the team so that is how we have approached our coaching staff,” Jones said in a statement. “With Neal Hatley moving to Bath we felt we needed to regenerate the forwards coaching area.

“Matt Proudfoot has had an outstanding coaching career to date culminating in being a World Cup-winning coach with South Africa. He brings great technical expertise and knowledge having coached in South Africa and Japan, and having played in Scotland and South Africa.

“We feel he can take the forwards to another level and build on the great work Neal and Steve have done over the last four years.”

Proudfoot said: “England is probably the best team in world rugby to coach. Having coached against them you get to respect their identity so to get the opportunity to be part of that is a huge honour and privilege.

“I am really grateful to Eddie, the rest of the coaching staff and the RFU to be given this chance.

“It is a decision I take with great humility and responsibility, and know there is a huge legacy to live up to. I look forward to taking that challenge on and doing England proud.”

Jones also said he had been looking to recruit Amor after he impressed him with his “rugby intellect” at pre-World Cup training camps.

England begin their Six Nations campaign on 2 February when they take on France in Paris. | Reuters