Jones wanted Wales’ Rees-zammit for England
WILLIAMSON IS KEEN TO BUILD FOR NEXT SEASON
EDDIE Jones attempted to persuade Louis Rees-zammit to choose England over Wales and having failed in his pursuit, he hopes the wing’s explosive development stalls on Saturday.
Rees-zammit’s duel with Gloucester team-mate Jonny May promises to be one of the highlights of the round three Guinness Six Nations title clash at the Principality Stadium.
Although one of the quickest wings in the game, May admits that “on a good day I can just about keep up with Louis. He’s incredibly fast, as fast as I’ve come across”.
Rees-zammit’s clinical finishing has been underlined by a haul of four tries in six Wales appearances, including two in the recent victory over Scotland, and Jones knew from an early stage the 20-year-old was a talent worth courting.
“I gave him a ring. I heard he was very Welsh and wanted to play for Wales and said if he was interested, we would be,” Jones said. “He had to do five years’ qualification in terms of residency and a young guy like him is not going to sit around for five years.
“I wished him good luck and I’m pleased he’s doing well – I just hope he does not do too well against us.
“Like any young player, there are areas of his game he is deficient in and we have to be good enough to find those areas. I am sure Jonny will share his thoughts on him and we will talk to him.
“Louis is progressing nicely and Jonny has been at the top of his game for three or four years, he was close to being the best left wing at the World Cup. Jonny constantly scores tries out of nowhere. It will be a great match-up.”
Meanwhile, Jones has hit back at a claim by England’s most capped full-back Mike Brown that his players are afraid to challenge the Australian head coach, adding “everyone has heard the scare stories and you don’t want to get on the wrong side of him”.
Jones said: “How do you know they have not been challenging me? It was a surprising comment by Mike. We have a shared responsibility here. There is a forum for players to speak up. It would be hard for me to say we have a dictatorial situation, which is what Mike Brown is alluding to. He is entitled to his opinion.
“Within our team, we have shared responsibility and do not hide away from that. I will give them a direction but ultimately the players decide the direction we go in.”
EVERTON manager Carlo Ancelotti said the happiest man at the club after their first win at Anfield in 22 years was his assistant Duncan Ferguson.
An early goal for Richarlison and a late penalty from Gylfi Sigurdsson consigned Liverpool to a fourth successive home defeat – their worst league run since 1923.
Victory, the first in 23 visits to Anfield, saw Everton draw level on 40 points with their seventh-placed hosts and they are just three behind fourthplaced Chelsea, with a match in hand over both clubs.
“I think the happiest man in our team was Duncan,” Ancelotti said of the former Toffees striker, who has experienced plenty of derby tussles against the Reds during his long stint with Everton but has not been able to celebrate victories in many of them.
“We are really happy. The performance was good, difficult, but the spirit of the team was good.
“We defended really well, we were clinical up front as we didn’t have a lot of opportunities but the opportunities we had we were able to convert really well.
“What this victory means is that we can compete, using our quality, maybe not the technical quality of Liverpool but we had a strong spirit in this period, our belief is improving, of course we have to improve.”
Ancelotti was asked whether he appreciated the extent to which he would be lauded for achieving victory against their neighbours, their first in the Merseyside derby since 2010.
“I realise I was the manager that beat Liverpool after 22 years,” he added.
“I don’t know if this is enough to be in the history of this club but if it is not enough I am working on it.”
Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp bemoaned more errors for handing the initiative to Everton and giving them a lead which they were not only able to hold but add to, albeit contentiously.
Asked how much it hurt he said: “A lot, a lot. But we conceded a completely unnecessary first goal, we should not forget that, and that is a big part of the game.
“You have to defend and you have to score and in one situation we didn’t defend well enough, we made a mistake so they could score, and we didn’t use the things we created. That’s why we have the result.”
Klopp could not understand the penalty decision after Dominic Calvert-lewin went down after running into the back of a sliding Trent Alexander-arnold nor the speed with which referee Chris Kavanagh viewed the pitchside monitor having been asked to look again by VAR.
“I really think it is unfair to ask me as everyone has asked me that question, which means everyone thought it wasn’t a penalty,” he added.
“I wanted to talk to the ref after my first few (post-match) interviews but they left already. I wanted to ask what did he see?
“If he is called over there must doubt but he needed only a second. He went over, watched it from three or four yards and ‘penalty.’”
As if losing their first home Merseyside derby since 1999 was not enough, Klopp lost yet another centre-back option, this time Jordan Henderson.
“It is the groin, adductor region. Nothing from the medical department was positive about it. It doesn’t look good but we have to look at the scan tomorrow,” the German said.
GATESHEAD player-manager Mike Williamson is hoping his third year at the Heed helm will be more conventional.
The Tynesiders played only 31 league games during Williamson’s first season in the hot seat before the Covid-19 pandemic struck.
Gateshead qualified for the final play-off spot last year when National League North was decided on points per game. An additional two games were played before Williamson gave away two penalties in a 5-2 play-off semi-final defeat at Boston United.
This season the Heed had played only 14 league games, and 16 in total, before the campaign hit the buffers.
The voting on resolutions set out by the National League were finalised on Thursday.
National League North and South voted 24-19 to null and void the 2020/21 season.
While the North had twice as many clubs not wanting to play on, the South division had a margin of three to continue.
Eighteen clubs across the two divisions have since contacted the League in a bid to be allowed to continue as one division or two.
The top flight
National League of the had a two-thirds majority to finish the season and maintain promotion to the EFL.
All four of the region’s Conference North clubs voted to end the season, with Williamson pleased to finally get a definitive decision.
“We’ve been in no man’s land, training but going four weeks without a game,” said the former Magpie.
“As footballers the lads just wanted to play games, but they fully understand the situation.
“It has been a crazy two seasons and you can’t predict the future, but hopefully next season will be far more straight forward.
“That includes crowds at games as we haven’t had fans at the stadium since last March, and it’s been a surreal experience.
“It’s been a sign of the times due to the coronavirus pandemic, we’ve just got to react to it and come back stronger.”
Williamson believes the decision to pull an ill-fated, stop-start season was the right one.
“I couldn’t see logistically how we could have fit all the fixtures in to such a short space of time,” he said.
“It would have been very difficult and Chorley had four or five muscle injuries when they returned to playing after a long lay-off.”
Gateshead were 10th in the Vanarama National League North when the plug was pulled.
They were two points outside the play-offs with games in hand on all but two of the sides above them.
A lack of consistency brought a return of six wins and seven defeats from their 16 league and cup games. First-round exits in the FA Cup and FA Trophy to league rivals Chorley and Farsley Celtic respectively were particularly disappointing.
Williamson rarely featured during his third year at the club. He said: “We lacked the experience to see out games and there’s no doubt conceding late goals hit us hard,” he added.
“From our first home game against Fylde, late goals proved to be our Achilles heel.
“It cost us a lot of points, and but for that we would have been right in the mix.
“When we played our football very few teams could get near to us and we looked very good. But the overall feeling is that we were vulnerable late on in games and it cost us dearly.”
A hastily put together Gateshead squad won only one of their opening seven games in Williamson’s first season in charge.
This season they managed only two wins from the first seven outings before again improving.
“We’ve had two slow starts before kicking on, and that’s something we need to address next season.”
Williamson hopes to retain the majority of his squad, while adding some quality additions and younger players with promise.
“We are always looking to improve but I’d like to keep the core of the squad,” he said. “Obviously we want to keep our best players. We’ll be successful with some and not others – that’s football.
“I’ve got a good idea of who I want to keep and a few others to make a decision on.
“The plus side is that we have now got plenty of time to prepare for next season.
“It’s a bit raw and hazy at the moment as we have just found out the current season has been ended.
“I’ll find out in due course what resources and facilities we have for next season.”
It has been a difficult time financially for National League clubs with grant