Jones fires warning to rivals

By Steve Grace
11/3/17

Head coach Eddie Jones fired a warning to the rest of the world after England retained their RBS 6 Nations title in emphatic fashion.

A hat-trick from Jonathan Joseph spearheaded a 61-21 rout of Scotland at Twickenham as England - who included Exeter Chiefs star Jack Nowell on the right wing - registered a record-equalling 18th successive Test victory, and Jones said they are only going to get better.

“I’ve got to give credit to the players. They’ve worked hard and learned new ways and when you’re a professional player it’s always hard to learn new things and they’ve been very open-minded,” Jones (pictured) told ITV.

“The exciting thing for us is that we’re only just starting. We’re one year into a four-year project and we’re going to get better and better.”

After a blip against Italy, where England were outfoxed by the Azzurri’s tactics but were still victorious, the Red Rose were impressive against Scotland, with Anthony Watson, Billy Vunipola and Danny Care (two) also crossing the whitewash, with Owen Farrell kicking 26 points.

“We started well and generally our intensity in the game was pretty good and it was the sort of performance we needed to have today because Scotland were a confident team and came down here with high expectations and we needed to play well,” Jones said.

“We’ve been ready to play well for a couple of weeks. I think we played well against Wales and dropped off in the middle of the game. In Italy we were ready to play a good game of rugby but as you know we didn’t play rugby.

“Today we got a chance to play rugby and I was really pleased with their efforts. Next week is about the grand slam and we are going to focus very closely on that.”

Scotland captain John Barclay did not pull his punches after the heavy defeat and called his side “useless”.

“We just didn’t show up today. We got off to a bad start and it continued,” the 30-year-old said.

“The discipline was very poor in the first half and there were soft tries. England are a very good side and are arguably the best team in the world, but for us, very disappointed obviously.

“We try to move away from that tag of plucky losers but that wasn’t plucky enough. That was useless. That’s not us. That’s not what we tried to build to.

“We have one week left, one game we can finish the championship with three (wins) from five but if we play like that, no chance.”

When asked if the numerous injuries to Scottish players affected the outcome of the match, Barclay added: “Not overly. You can’t look at that as an excuse. We train for these scenarios.”