England moving in the right direction, says Eddie Jones

[Heathen]

Delusional Eddie in the TRP :

Eddie Jones has said that his England side are "moving in the right direction" ahead of Saturday's crunch Six Nations fixture with Ireland.

Jones stated: "We’ve got a young squad and a good squad. We are pleased with the development of the squad.

"We’re moving in the right direction. Like any team, it's not a straight line to the top.

"We’ve had our ups and downs. But, the spirit of the team is good and the development of the game we want to play is good. We are looking forward to Saturday!”

[DGP Wasp]

From an Australian perspective the England team probably is moving in very much the right direction.

[hookender]

From an Australian perspective the England team probably is moving in very much the right direction.

Down and under?

[WonkyWasp]

     

[westwaleswasp]

Definitely worth a like.....)

[Skippy]

He’s mistaking activity for movement.

[hopwood]

The only reason I might cut Eddie some slack over the next 9 months is the fact that Martin Gleeson is now attack coach.
They’re trying to incorporate a whole new way of playing, where there’s no set structure and the players play off each other and play what they see.
It makes it very hard to defend against.

To be honest, this is the kind of approach most fans have been calling for, for a number of years, whereby you empower the players and give them ownership.

It seems the penny has finally dropped with Eddie…and he’s begrudgingly releasing control to the players.
His problem has been his obsessive over controlling patterns of behaviour.

But it seems with the introduction of Gleeson and his creative mind, England are attempting to play an exciting style of rugby that could pay dividends.

Unfortunately, it’ll take a year to properly bed-in and impatient fans (who don’t necessarily understand what they’re trying to achieve) might lose patience just at the moment they should actually give Eddie a touch of slack.

I’ve been Eddie’s number 1 criticiser. Other than his first year, I haven’t liked his inflexible way of doing things.
Finally the penny has dropped. 
But, it’s at least 2 years late…and France and Ireland are way ahead on the development of their particular style.
Could we peak for the World Cup? Maybe.
But I just wish everything didn’t revolve around a blasted World Cup every 4 years.

We shall see.


PS Charlie Morgan ran a very good article in the Telegraph the other week, after he questioned Eddie as to what they were trying to achieve. It actually all makes sense….but it’s all rather late in the day.

[Bloke in North Dorset]

The rugby chaos theory.

Sounds great in theory but I don’t  see it working at England international level.  The players don’t get enough time together, I heard a stat that the pack had players from 8 different teams at one point.  There’s too much pressure on Eddie, and whoever replaces him, to get results and after a couple of losses the coach will have to intervene and apply some structure. 

It might work for Ireland as they draw their players from such a small pool that they all know each other well, even if the aren’t in the same club team.

It works for France because that’s the way France play and if anything what’s improved their game is applying a bit of defensive structure. 

[mike909]

If he was going to do this - then the opportunity was with a Sarries based team....and yet he's been quoted as the team being "too Sarries orientated" and he's dropped two of the players that have allowed England to play more off the cuff. It's not easy to do if you are not making yards/attracting tacklers. What Billy and Mako were doing for England even as recently as France last 6Ns

But if the Sarries influence was too much, he wouldn't have Farrell, George, Itoje, Isiekew, Malins and Daly involved, no?

And if - as suggested - the Vuni's were a problem, what does it say about the coach(es) that the solution to the "problem" involved losing the assets that were most likely to allow a more ad hoc approach?

And as someone said (a coach) players might not need numbers but they do need roles - at least in part - otherwise, no one has anything to fall back upon and the danger of a selection like vs Wales, is that too many multi task players means too few outstanding players. Where is the pace? Where is the gain line breakers?

Be great if it comes off - but if the players aren't doing it for their clubs, it's likely a non starter as soon as the pressure comes on......

It's an approach that's allowed us to score big totals vs Sarries, ironically, but it needed us to have top grade players within the overall framework. Piutau x2, Wade, Daly, Robson, Smith G, Hughes, etc. etc. all players happy playing what is in front of them. Even Quins with Smith are playing to a plan for me.

[Bloke in North Dorset]

But if the Sarries influence was too much, he wouldn't have Farrell, George, Itoje, Isiekew, Malins and Daly involved, no?

If that was the plan I'd add Alex Goode as well.