Eddie Jones has been backed to steer England at subsequent yr’s Rugby World Cup after the Rugby Football Union insisted “Eddie is the guy to take us there”.
The Australian has a contract till the tip of the 2023 match in France and eased mounting strain on his place by masterminding this month’s 2-1 tour victory over his native nation.
RFU chief government Bill Sweeney mentioned Jones’ spectacular document in opposition to main southern hemisphere nations – 20 wins from 25 – was central to the nationwide governing physique preserving religion.
He additionally conceded that evolving England require enchancment in quite a lot of areas in an effort to be aggressive throughout Test rugby’s showpiece competitors.
“We’d expect him to go through to ’23,” Sweeney mentioned of Jones. “It is tough at the highest level of sport. There is so much scrutiny and reasonable scrutiny.
“I think it is important sometimes not to over-react but it is also equally important not to under-react.
“We don’t just have a review after every major tournament, we have an ongoing review process. We will clearly be doing that with Eddie and the coaches when they come back, they are due back at the end of the month.
“We have been looking for signs of ‘are we on track?’, ‘do we still believe in the direction we’re going in?’ and ‘do we have the confidence (in Jones)?’ and we’ve said we do.
“We are not blind to some of the areas that need to be addressed. We’ve got to improve a lot to be competitive.
“The challenge for us is to improve at the rate we think is good enough to be fully competitive in 2023. And we do believe Eddie is the guy to take us there.”
Jones guided England to the ultimate of the 2019 World Cup in Japan – the place they had been overwhelmed by South Africa – however his place has since come below elevated scrutiny on the again of two dismal Six Nations campaigns.
Victory in Australia, which was not fully convincing however secured within the absence of a number of key males, has a minimum of placated among the 62-year-old’s detractors.
“One of the reasons we feel very confident around decisions and around conversations regarding Eddie is his win ratio, particularly in the southern hemisphere,” continued Sweeney.
“I think that’s now 25 games against tier one southern hemisphere teams and 20 of those won, so it’s an 80 per cent win ratio. If you add in the other southern hemisphere teams, it goes up to about 82 per cent win ratio.
“And, if you’re going to do well in a World Cup, you’re going to have to go across a run and beat at least three, maybe even four, southern hemisphere teams.
“We feel that’s an advantage and that’s something we’ve got with him that we rank pretty highly.”
Sweeney missed the victorious sequence Down Under after struggling a pulmonary embolism.
The CEO insisted he has fully recovered from the latest well being scare.
“I’m fully fit now, back to it,” he mentioned. “I had a six-day stint in hospital, came out, I’ve been back at work eight weeks, been back in the gym virtually every day for about the last six weeks so hopefully one more scan to go and back to normality.
“The doctors wouldn’t let me fly, unfortunately, down to Australia.”
Source: www.impartial.co.uk