Rassie Erasmus holds the solution to England's Jamie George conundrum

If the hackneyed sporting adage ‘you either win or you learn’ is anything to go by, the England squad have been treated to enough information over the last three weeks to come out of the Autumn Nations Series with PhDs.

The lessons have been varied and painful, with England’s attack coming under the microscope one week, followed by their defence the next. But one lesson that England do not appear to be learning is that captain Jamie George is being removed too early.

No sooner had the final whistle blown against South Africa than George was being peppered with questions over his early substitutions. He played them with a straight bat, but it must be agony for any captain to helplessly watch his side unravel from the sidelines.

England’s tactics against South Africa over 80 mins | RPTV

Boks Office, with guest Steven Kitshoff, discuss England’s loss to the Springboks. Watch the full show on RugbyPass TV now

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England’s tactics against South Africa over 80 mins | RPTV

Boks Office, with guest Steven Kitshoff, discuss England’s loss to the Springboks. Watch the full show on RugbyPass TV now

Watch now

There are clearly metrics that indicate George’s performance dips early in the second half and Steve Borthwick acts accordingly. But there are intangibles that will never be reified as data on a screen- leadership, composure, decision-making – all the attributes England have appeared to be shorn of when it comes to the crunch.

England’s skipper managed 52 minutes against the All Blacks (with a further three at the end), 50 against Australia and only 48 against South Africa. The side have therefore been without their captain for over a third of the entire November campaign to date.

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Theo Dan and Luke Cowan-Dickie have performed well in George’s stead, particularly the Saracen’s eye-catching display against the All Blacks. But it has been plain for all to see at Twickenham’s Allianz Stadium that the home side have been crying out for direction and a calming influence in the dying embers of each match.

Fortunately for Borthwick, there is a solution. What’s even better is that it is the brainchild of the all-conquering duo of Rassie Erasmus and Jacques Nienaber.

The Springboks are in a nice position of having two world-class hookers in Bongi Mbonambi and Malcolm Marx that they can chop and change, so much so that a third would just unnecessarily complicate things.

The South African coaching staff knew this heading into the World Cup last year, and thus decided to select just the two hookers in their squad. Crucially though, they had a player in flanker Deon Fourie someone who was more than comfortable moonlighting as a hooker and had played a fair portion of his career there. Therein lies England’s answer.

Disaster struck, however, after just one match when Marx was ruled out of the rest of the tournament with a knee injury, leaving everyone to debate which hooker would be called up in his place. But Erasmus and Nienaber had other plans and selected fly-half Handre Pollard, putting their faith in Deon Fourie as Mbonambi’s back-up, as well as fellow back-row Marco van Staden.

For the rest of the pool stage Mbonambi shared the workload with Fourie (albeit with mixed results at times). In fact, the Boks’ first choice was given the day off in the final match against Tonga, with Fourie starting and van Staden wearing the No 16 jersey. The substitute hooker did come on, but most importantly it was for Siya Kolisi.

When it came to the knockouts though, the machinations of Erasmus and Nienaber were clear. Mbonambi played almost the entire match against France in the quarter-finals and played the full 80 against England a week later. South Africa still got their money’s worth out of substitute hooker Fourie though, who played the final 35 minutes against France and the final half hour against England on the flank. When Mbonambi was roped off against Les Bleus, that’s when he moonlighted as a hooker for the final five minutes.

It was a different matter in the final, with Mbonambi leaving the field injured after only four minutes. Suddenly Fourie was required to play almost an 80 minute stretch in his unfavoured position. This was when the schemes of Erasmus and Nienaber looked like they had blown up in their faces. But Fourie passed with flying colours. It was a stroke of genius. What’s more, the decision to turn to Pollard in place of Marx was perhaps even more defining as they defended the Webb Ellis Cup.

George is England’s equivalent to Mbonambi. When push came to shove for the Boks at the World Cup, they wanted the Sharks hooker on as much as possible, but knew they had a willing and able deputy in Fourie who primarily still served as a back-row replacement.

England must now find their Fourie.

There are a number of ways England could go about finding their Fourie. One is converting a current hooker to play in the back-row.

It is not impossible to imagine Theo Dan playing on the flank. The 23-year-old is mobile and packs a punch in contact and, as hookers go, he’s on the lighter side. But could he be converted into a Test-grade back-row? Perhaps not. What’s more, is it fair to scupper a promising career in the making for a player that has solely devoted himself to playing in the front-row?

Another alternative is for England to look for hookers that have dabbled in the back-row. Such players do exist in the Gallagher Premiership. During an injury crisis in 2022, the six-cap Jamie Blamire filled in at openside flanker for Newcastle Falcons. Likewise, Bristol Bears No 2 Gabriel Oghre had a stint at openside to much acclaim while at Wasps. They are not even deemed serviceable back-up hookers to George currently though in Borthwick’s eyes, so fitting them onto England’s bench purely due to their versatility would likely be detrimental to the side’s performance.

But this is still not following the Springboks’ blueprint. Fourie, and also van Staden, are not hookers first and foremost, they are flankers that can shift up in the scrum. There is still one obvious option.

Bath’s Alfie Barbeary has long been seen as an England international in the making. The bulldozing back-row has been beset by injuries though, which has certainly hampered his form this season, as well as an untimely ban when he looked on the cusp of making an England squad.

The 24-year-old started his career flitting between the loose forwards and hooker while at Wasps. Former Wasps boss Lee Blackett was clearly an advocate of the hooker/flanker hybrid, as former Springbok Ashley Johnson was used in the same way.

Barbeary eventually committed to the back-row, with Blackett revealing that the only reason he laboured at hooker was to boost his chances of playing for England.

“Alfie loved being in the back row,” Blackett said in 2021. “He didn’t enjoy hooker anywhere near as much and probably, in all honesty, the only thing that was motivating him to play there was to play for England.”

Maybe the answer for Barbeary is not to play hooker and not to play in the back-row (primarily a No 8 for Bath), but both.

Out-of-form players should not be shoehorned into the England squad, but there is little doubt that an in-form Barbeary has all the credentials to be a great Test player.

This is a plan that may take some time, as he may need to switch his attention to the front-row again, albeit only as a moonlighter. The Six Nations may come too early, as after all, he needs to find form as a No 8 first, but England have a potential Fourie in him.

This may also satisfy two salient issues that have arisen as Barbeary could add some real heft to a bench that has failed to lay a punch in truth over the past month.

George is 34, this is not a role that will be required of any player for many years. But while he remains captain, the flanker/hooker hybrid seems ideal.

The final, and most simple, solution is just to keep George on for longer. But then England are effectively wasting a space on the bench in the pack. Another great lesson Erasmus has taught the world is the importance of the bench and using it to its maximum potential- having a player who is only granted scraps at the end of a match would not be doing so.

England’s skipper won’t be needed to go the distance every match. What this does mean is in situations where he is required to, Borthwick will know he won’t have a replacement hooker that is nothing more than a glorified cheerleader for 80 minutes wasting away on his bench.

The Springboks head coach is not some madcap rugby philosopher left to conjure crackpot schemes in his attic; he is the brains behind the reigning world number ones and back-to-back world champions, and worth trying to emulate.

Wins have been few and far between this year for England. So if that has indeed provided them with an opportunity to ‘learn’, they should look no further than Dr Rassie Erasmus (literally a doctor) as their teacher.