The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Telfer launches withering attack on ‘Trump-like’ England coach –
Former Scotland coach launches attack on England chief
Former Scotland coach Jim Telfer has launched a withering attack on England boss Eddie Jones, Twickenham and Red Rose supporters.
Telfer, who was at the helm the last time the Scots won the Championship in 1999, accuses Jones of being disrespectful and compares him to US President Donald Trump in the way he talks.
The former British and Irish Lions assistant coach is equally scathing of the home of English rugby, insisting that an afternoon at Twickenham strengthens the case for Scottish independence from the United Kingdom.
“Eddie Jones doesn’t want to beat teams, he wants to demolish them, which I find a bit disappointing,” Telfer told BBC Sport.
“To me he’s building his whole team on set-piece and the building of the attack comes secondary. Having coached Australia and Japan you would have thought the opposite would be the case.
“The way he speaks, it’s a bit like Donald Trump. He wants to be the big man, you know?
“His goal is to win the World Cup in 2019 and so far it’s gone well, but I think he could be a little more circumspect, show a bit more respect for the opposition.
“He doesn’t seem to show much respect and it could come back to bite him.”
Jones has himself admitted using the same tactic of repetition that Trump employs in his bid to get England back to the top of world rugby.
Having given his assessment of Jones– – who oversaw a perfect run of 13 successive Test wins in 2016 – Telfer turned his attention to England’s fans and ground.
“Twickenham I find intimidating. The whole atmosphere is intimidating, there’s so many of them, three tiers of them,” Telfer said.
“If you ever think about wanting separation from England just sit 10 minutes in Twickenham and listen to them.
“They think they’re superior and a lot of them will come from the south-east, bags of money and bags of this and bags of that. They don’t really appreciate the other team.
“In France they just boo the other team, in Argentina they boo the other team, in England it’s just disdain – ‘Why are we playing these plebs?’.
“I don’t like Twickenham; a concrete jungle, nothing attractive about it at all.”