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Eddie Jones used beer slab to send message to England's Luke Cowan-Dickie

By PA
Luke Cowan Dickie and Eddie Jones /Getty

Luke Cowan-Dickie recalled an unusual early warning from Eddie Jones as he gets set to be named among England’s vice-captains for the Guinness Six Nations.

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Cowan-Dickie’s status as a young father has brought with it a fresh sense of responsibility and the spillover into his career is a newly discovered commitment to conditioning.

The 28-year-old’s leaner and more powerful frame has meant greater impact for longer on the field for Exeter and is the result of an attitude shift having earned a reputation that even reached Jones when he took over England in 2016.

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“I heard Luke was a bit of drinker. When he walked in, I put a crate of beers on the table. He made me laugh because after we’d had our chat, he walked off with the beers,” Jones said in his autobiography ‘My Life and Rugby’.

At the time, Cowan-Dickie quickly identified the underlying message wrapped in Jones’ humorous gesture.

“It wasn’t a test because I left the room without them and he told me to come back and get them! He said if I get thirsty I can have one in the room,” said Cowan-Dickie, who is poised to be named among England’s vice captains for the Guinness Six Nations.

“The issue was they were cans of Guinness and not so nice! What was my reaction? I thanked him. A crate of 24 free Guinness, you can’t turn that down!

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“I think it was more a statement by him, as if to say ‘I know what you’re like and I don’t want you to be like that’. It was a nice way of putting his foot down.”

Luke Cowan-Dickie
Luke Cowan-Dickie /PA

In evidence of his growing maturity, Cowan-Dickie was asked by Jones to be one of England’s vice-captains for the autumn only for ankle ligament damage to rule him out of all three Tests.

With Owen Farrell missing the entire Six Nations because of his own ankle injury, Jones is keen to expand the leadership group as part of his team rebuilding project for the 2023 World Cup.

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It comes a time when Cowan-Dickie has resolved to extract the most of his England career, his confidence soaring after emerging as the British and Irish Lions’ first choice hooker in South Africa last year.

He said: “I’ve grown up slightly and I’m getting old so I have to recover. I never used to recover, never used to do stuff like that.

“Before I had my kid rugby was my job but I used to skip all the recoveries and all the extras I may need to do.

“I have always carried a bit of extra body fat and my weight varies quite often. I like everything that’s bad! I like biscuits, I like chocolate, I like sweets. I like eating my little man’s leftovers, which I’ve cut out quite bit.

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“Plus my missus is on a little bit of a health kick so instead of cooking a pasta bake for eight people when there are only two of us in the house, so I finish the whole bowl, we have a chicken salad. So things have changed.

“I just thought having time off with the injury, I would get in the best shape I could try and get in. I feel better on the pitch.

“I feel more mobile and that I make more contributions in the game. And I feel there’s not a major drop-off towards the end of the game.”

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J
JW 1 hour ago
'Passionate reunion of France and New Zealand shows Fabien Galthie is wrong to rest his stars'

Where? I remember saying "unders"? The LNR was formed by the FFR, if I said that in a way that meant the 'pro' side of the game didn't have an equal representation/say as the 'amateur' side (FFR remit) that was not my intent.


But also, as it is the governing body, it also has more responsibility. As long as WR looks at FFR as the running body for rugby in France, that 'power' will remain. If the LNR refuses to govern their clubs use of players to enable a request by FFR (from WR) to ensure it's players are able to compete in International rugby takes place they will simply remove their participation. If the players complain to the France's body, either of their health and safety concerns (through playing too many 'minutes' etc) or that they are not allowed to be part in matches of national interest, my understanding is action can be taken against the LNR like it could be any other body/business. I see where you're coming from now re EPCR and the shake up they gave it, yes, that wasn't meant to be a separate statement to say that FFR can threaten them with EPCR expulsion by itself, simply that it would be a strong repercussion for those teams to be removed (no one would want them after the above).


You keep bringing up these other things I cannot understand why. Again, do you think if the LNR were not acting responsibly they would be able to get away with whatever they want (the attitude of these posters saying "they pay the players")? You may deem what theyre doing currently as being irresponsible but most do not. Countries like New Zealand have not even complained about it because they've never had it different, never got things like windfall TV contracts from France, so they can't complain because theyre not missing out on anything. Sure, if the French kept doing things like withholding million dollar game payments, or causing millions of dollars of devaluation in rights, they these things I'm outlining would be taking place. That's not the case currently however, no one here really cares what the French do. It's upto them to sort themselves out if they're not happy. Now, that said, if they did make it obvious to World Rugby that they were never going to send the French side away (like they possibly did stating their intent to exclude 20 targeted players) in July, well then they would simply be given XV fixtures against tier 2 sides during that window and the FFR would need to do things like the 50/50 revenue split to get big teams visiting in Nov.

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