- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
I’ve just finished watching a mixed affair from the Stadio Olimpico, and it leaves me conflicted.
Eddie Jones is clearly playing things safe. A coach who famously understands how the media works and can be worked, Jones has given himself plenty of wriggle room with the selections he has made so far.
In picking a first XV that generally resembles the Stuart Lancaster era, he is yet to stamp his own selections upon a blueprint that was not as wholly terrible as the World Cup campaign may have suggested.
I could list the potential young England players in the Aviva Premiership who could have been included in the England 23 based on recent form, but for Jones to include these players would be a risk too much, too soon. A bad result with the current (older) line-up and he can always claim he is building and getting to know the team he has.
There is a part of me that wishes Kieran Brookes, Maro Itoje, Elliot Daly, and Christian Wade were on that team sheet for the Scotland game, but I can understand the logic behind Jones’ decisions.
And that’s the crux of it, Jones has a plan. There is a logic to everything he does and he also has the experience to be patient. Exceptional players now will be exceptional in a couple of months, and if their form has disappeared, well then they were not the second coming the media proclaimed them to be.
This stands in stark contrast to Lancaster, who leading into the World Cup demonstrated a complete lack of logic. Sam Burgess for centre? With the benefit of hindsight, that’s a ridiculous selection, but even at the time no one could unpick the logic behind that decision.
What Jones has instead demonstrated is that his priority lies in giving a badly mauled English pack their teeth back. And if that means the backs have to look after themselves until that happens, then so be it.
Jones has done this by building a base of strength. Dylan Hartley is the best international hooker England have had since Steve Thompson. His discipline record is colourful but the season Martin Johnson was selected to be Lions captain in 1997 he split a man’s head open with a single punch. Different eras obviously mean different expectations, but it’s rugby, Hartley is a hooker, he’s aggressive, get over it.
Significantly, Jones’ bench selections have given the clearest clue as to the future of this England team. He picks a bench that is designed to produce a difference when introduced; sounds simple but in the Lancaster era you could set your watch for when substitutes would be used because, most depressingly, those decisions had been made hours before kick-off.
Against Scotland, substitutes were left relatively unused due to the close nature of the contest and when they were employed, it was experienced players like Mako Vunipola who were asked to make the difference. Against Italy, he had a 6-2 forward-back split, so he could flood the field with physical, fast and aggressive forward substitutes that ultimately gave England a comfortable win against a tiring Italian pack; a ploy reminiscent of Toulon against Saracens in the 2014 Heineken Cup final.
England’s attacking play also shows a refreshingly clear and coherent approach, if not overly exciting. The plan can basically be summed up with two words. Kick. Chase.
It’s a low-risk strategy playing in the Six Nations where you’re facing a back three containing no one more threatening than Virimi Vakatawa for France. Obviously if England were to attempt this strategy against Nehe Milner-Skudder, Israel Folau or Juan Imhoff then it might be a little riskier.
It is this two-word game plan that encapsulates Jones’s approach, why strain yourself looking for magic remedies when it’s not necessary in a competition that is as low in quality as the Six Nations at the moment?
Ultimately Jones’s masterstroke has been to give the media nothing but wins to talk about. No selections perceived as risky, no game plans considered especially revolutionary. Every decision he makes, every word he says seems to be carefully considered and there has been nothing outside of his control, so far, that has caused him to miss a step.
True, the England team can haemorrhage penalties at an alarming rate for no discernible reason but that particular problem is unfathomable. Jones is good but he’s not God, and it’s a long-term problem for a long term solution.
What will change before Joe Schmidt’s injury-decimated Ireland visit Twickenham is that England will be favourites, and that prospect presents the first risk of Eddie Jones’s tenure. Does he stick with a team that are stable and risk repeating previous mistakes made by Lancaster teams of the past, or does he twist by selecting potential over experience?
We already know the answer, he’ll stick with his current first team because Eddie’s England are strong-ish; their forwards, through Dylan Hartley, George Kruis and Billy Vunipola look aggressive and mean. And he will twist with his subs bench but we will be unable to make any accurate long-term conclusions concerning Eddie’s England until the summer and November tours involving the Southern Hemisphere giants have taken place.
One bright note for England supporters is that under Eddie Jones, they do not look like making the same silly mistakes that have defined the last four years of English rugby.
That should worry the teams north of the equator and will make the Wales-England Twickenham encounter crucial to the destination of this year’s Six Nations trophy. However, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina are still in a different league.
Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.