The wheels are coming off the English chariot.
After two years of unprecedented and virtually unstinting success under Eddie Jones, England’s rugby team has hit problems just as the 2019 Rugby World Cup is looming into view.
“I always said this year would be the hardest year we’d have,” Jones said of the third year in England’s World Cup cycle.
He’s been proven right.
The English won the last two Six Nations under Jones, one a Grand Slam. After back-to-back losses to Scotland and France over the past two weeks, they are in danger of finishing in fifth place — their lowest position in the tournament since 1983 when it was called the Five Nations.
The English won 24 of their first 25 tests. Now, they are staring at three straight losses, which hasn’t happened to them in the Six Nations since 2008.
The home match against Grand Slam-chasing Ireland on Saturday is shaping up to be a crucial one for Jones on his journey with England to the Rugby World Cup in Japan.
It wasn’t long ago that most rugby experts were saying England was the team most likely to stop New Zealand being world champion for the third straight time. “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” — England’s rugby anthem — was being sung with added gusto around Twickenham.
Frailties have been exposed in recent weeks, though.
This is England’s biggest weakness — and Jones knows it.
“It’s a sizeable but fixable problem,” Jones said on Saturday after the 22-16 loss in France. “We can address it and keep getting better at it, but the reality is that we probably won’t get better at it until the World Cup.”
In Paris, the English were turned over 11 times, a contributing factor to their massive penalty count of 16. They were demolished at the breakdown in the 25-13 loss to Scotland last month and nothing changed against France.
In both games, Chris Robshaw was England’s openside flanker and he’s not a natural there, preferring instead to play on the blindside. Jones knows that, too, having criticized England’s deployment of Robshaw in that position during the Rugby World Cup when in charge of Japan.
Jones has also said England is struggling at the breakdown because there is a difference in attitudes to the tackle area in international rugby and in England’s domestic’s Premiership, in which fewer numbers are committed to the ruck. AP
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