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James Haskell slams 'utter madness' of Eddie Jones axing

Eddie Jones head coach of England and James Haskell of England ins discussion during the England Captain's Run on the eve of the RBS 6 Nations match against Scotland at Twickenham Stadium on March 10, 2017 in London, England. (Photo by Dan Mullan/Getty Images)

Former England flanker James Haskell has described the Rugby Football Union’s decision to sack head coach Eddie Jones nine months out from the Rugby World Cup as “utter madness”.

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Speaking to Sky Sports in the wake of Jones’ dismissal, the 77-cap ex England loose forward pointed the finger at “some grumpy old journalists and some miserable fans” who ganged up to oust his former coach.

Haskell played the best rugby of his career under Jones’ tutelage between 2016 and 2018, and described the Australian as “by far and away the best coach I’ve ever worked with,” while also highlighting his impressive record at World Cups.

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“Personally, it’s utter madness,” the former Wasps and Northampton Saints flanker said. “You have literally taken the most successful World Cup coach, with a 90 percent winning record, and binned him nine months before a World Cup. He’s been to three World Cup finals. He’s won one and lost two. And he took Japan to some of the biggest upsets they’ve ever had.

“And then the best thing is, the person they want to replace him with at this point in time is not available, so you’re going to put someone else in charge for the Six Nations who hasn’t been an international coach just because of some grumpy old journalists and some miserable fans who’ve decided to gang up to get rid of him, which is pretty much the story of the modern world. If you shout loud enough and you’ve got enough fans in the media, you can achieve anything.”

“A lot of times, if you upset people and don’t conform, and Eddie Jones doesn’t conform- does he get everything right? No, I don’t think anybody gets everything right.

“Unfortunately, I think that because Eddie didn’t conform, didn’t play to the media’s tune, there were some guys that just didn’t want him in there.

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“Look, the Six Nations was disappointing, the autumn internationals were disappointing, but not to the degree where there were such catastrophic errors. What some of these older heads are doing and some of these older journalists who don’t like Eddie, who don’t actually come down and watch training, they don’t speak to any of the current players, they’re not particularly popular with current players because of their opinions because they’re there to sell newspapers. Then you’ve got ex coaches who have agendas and vendettas who are able to use their media platform to put things out there. It’s not based on fact, it’s rhetoric, it’s nonsense. You talk about the players not being confident, you talk about the players losing their shine, you talk about players coming in and out squad. Eddie’s there to put the best players on the field and I had five international coaches with England, and they were some of the worst environments I’ve ever been part of.

“Eddie Jones is by far and away the best coach I’ve ever worked with. He understood how to get the best out of the players, create a competitive environment, create a professional environment, and some of these journalists, when they recommend coaches to take over, the people they’re suggesting are not in the same league as Eddie Jones.”

Jones’ former assistant coach with England and Japan, Steve Borthwick, has emerged as the frontrunner to replace Jones having guided Leicester Tigers to Gallagher Premiership glory earlier this year. Having played alongside him, and worked under him after becoming a coach, Haskell was hugely complimentary of Borthwick.

“If the person taking over is Steve Borthwick, I think he’s utterly brilliant,” he said. “If anybody could take over from Eddie Jones, I can’t think of a better person. He’s the number one person that I would have suggested. I didn’t think a million years they’d ever get him because of what a good job he’s doing with [Leicester] Tigers. If they get Kevin Sinfield as well, then England are in a good place and it’s a nice transition.”

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J
JW 2 hours ago
'Passionate reunion of France and New Zealand shows Fabien Galthie is wrong to rest his stars'

Ok, managed to read the full article..

... New Zealand’s has only 14 and the professional season is all over within four months. In France, club governance is the responsibility of an independent organisation [the Ligue Nationale de Rugby or LNR] which is entirely separate from the host union [the Fédération Française de Rugby or FFR]. Down south New Zealand Rugby runs the provincial and the national game.

That is the National Provincial Championship, a competition of 14 representative union based teams run through the SH international window and only semi professional (paid only during it's running). It is run by NZR and goes for two and a half months.


Super Rugby is a competition involving 12 fully professional teams, of which 5 are of New Zealand eligibility, and another joint administered team of Pacific Island eligibility, with NZR involvement. It was a 18 week competition this year, so involved (randomly chosen I believe) extra return fixtures (2 or 3 home and away derbys), and is run by Super Rugby Pacific's own independent Board (or organisation). The teams may or may not be independently run and owned (note, this does not necessarily mean what you think of as 'privately owned').


LNR was setup by FFR and the French Government to administer the professional game in France. In New Zealand, the Players Association and Super Rugby franchises agreed last month to not setup their own governance structure for professional rugby and re-aligned themselves with New Zealand Rugby. They had been proposing to do something like the English model, I'm not sure how closely that would have been aligned to the French system but it did not sound like it would have French union executive representation on it like the LNR does.

In the shaky isles the professional pyramid tapers to a point with the almighty All Blacks. In France the feeling for country is no more important than the sense of fierce local identity spawned at myriad clubs concentrated in the southwest. Progress is achieved by a nonchalant shrug and the wide sweep of nuanced negotiation, rather than driven from the top by a single intense focus.

Yes, it is pretty much a 'representative' selection system at every level, but these union's are having to fight for their existence against the regime that is NZR, and are currently going through their own battle, just as France has recently as I understand it. A single focus, ala the French game, might not be the best outcome for rugby as a whole.


For pure theatre, it is a wonderful article so far. I prefer 'Ntamack New Zealand 2022' though.

The young Crusader still struggles to solve the puzzle posed by the shorter, more compact tight-heads at this level but he had no problem at all with Colombe.

It was interesting to listen to Manny during an interview on Maul or Nothing, he citied that after a bit of banter with the All Black's he no longer wanted one of their jersey's after the game. One of those talks was an eye to eye chat with Tamaiti Williams, there appear to be nothing between the lock and prop, just a lot of give and take. I thought TW angled in and caused Taylor to pop a few times, and that NZ were lucky to be rewarded.

f you have a forward of 6ft 8ins and 145kg, and he is not at all disturbed by a dysfunctional set-piece, you are in business.

He talked about the clarity of the leadership that helped alleviate any need for anxiety at the predicaments unfolding before him. The same cannot be said for New Zealand when they had 5 minutes left to retrieve a match winning penalty, I don't believe. Did the team in black have much of a plan at any point in the game? I don't really call an autonomous 10 vehicle they had as innovative. I think Razor needs to go back to the dealer and get a new game driver on that one.

Vaa’i is no match for his power on the ground. Even in reverse, Meafou is like a tractor motoring backwards in low gear, trampling all in its path.

Vaa'i actually stops him in his tracks. He gets what could have been a dubious 'tackle' on him?

A high-level offence will often try to identify and exploit big forwards who can be slower to reload, and therefore vulnerable to two quick plays run at them consecutively.

Yes he was just standing on his haunches wasn't he? He mentioned that in the interview, saying that not only did you just get up and back into the line to find the opposition was already set and running at you they also hit harder than anything he'd experienced in the Top 14. He was referring to New Zealands ultra-physical, burst-based Super style of course, which he was more than a bit surprised about. I don't blame him for being caught out.


He still sent the obstruction back to the repair yard though!

What wouldn’t the New Zealand rugby public give to see the likes of Mauvaka and Meafou up front..

Common now Nick, don't go there! Meafou showed his Toulouse shirt and promptly got his citizenship, New Zealand can't have him, surely?!?


As I have said before with these subjects, really enjoy your enthusiasm for their contribution on the field and I'd love to see more of their shapes running out for Vern Cotter and the like styled teams.

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