England v Australia: Ex-team-mates Eddie Jones & Michael Cheika go head-to-head
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By Tom Fordyce
Chief sports writer in Oita, Japan
Eddie Jones changes at the week after his England negative plays his native Australia: more animated, more populous , up earlier and to bed by his standards.
Now that game falls in the quarter-finals of a World Cup, with his standing as England coach likely to be defined that which may follow and by what happens in the Oita Stadium on Saturday that has been ramped up farther still.
There’s the coaching competition: the former Randwick hooker, Jones up former Randwick number eight, against Michael Cheika. There’s maybe more, what a triumph would imply: a World Cup semi-final. That is what overcome might cause: the conclusion of a regime, a reappraisal of all it was constructed on.
Both coaches have amazed with their team selections – Jones by providing a 19-year-old a primary run at centre to the Wallabies and falling George Ford and George Kruis, Cheika by altering his matching again.
Neither guy is likely to happen to be bothered in the least. They share club and a home city, but also a urge to prove the remainder of the world wrong.
“You can’t only make a flippant comment with Eddie,” says Stirling Mortlock, the prior Wallabies skipper who performed Jones for country and franchise.
“If you are going to say anything, you want to have any stats supporting it and also you need to have some certainty. Otherwise he’ll call you out immediately -‘partner, that is incorrect; bang, bang’.
“I don’t know whether I was scared of Eddie, but certainly after being trained by him for a lengthy time period, you understand that what he wants is everyone to attempt and get better, day in, day out. And if you are not doing that, that’s a problem straight away.
“If you’re doing that, then he is going to saylet’s work in your own rugby intellect, or let’s do anything else off the field. He constantly wants to see people .
“He is always looking at the international dynamic of where the match is going. He will tear that up with stats, he’ll debunk any other view until he’s clear about where he would like to go and what kind of people he wants to grow that.”
Jones’ starting XV is everything he has always wanted England to be: big, powerful, packed with ball-carriers that are powerful, based about a rock-solid set-piece.
Ford England’s greatest player in their three wins, is gone , sent to the seat as Owen Farrell is shifted to 10 from inside center. Anywhere you look is electricity muscle and snarl.
Australia used to favor contrasting techniques. Their march to the World Cup closing was predicated upon the guile and quick-thinking of both Matt Giteau and Bernard Foley. This time Cheika has followed the Jones manner: a scrum and line-out that’s a weapon rather than weakness, 17 rock of Samu Kerevi at 6ft 3ins of Jordan Petaia next to him.
“As a player’Cheik’ certainly did all of his speaking out on the area,” says Mortlock. “He was amazingly combative, nearly a thug on the pitch.
“One of my first games was contrary to Randwick, him and his brothers. And you also did not really need to go near the Cheika brothers.
“I had been a youthful full-back with a complete head of hairand away from a midfield scrum-play I stepped back into Cheik and also obtained a nice broken nose to my troubles.
“I feel like as a trainer and leader, he can’t help but default to this authentic ardent character.
“He can’t bash people any longer, he can not get up that bodily head of steam. So it is really tough for him personally. He wants to let out a few expletives, however he can’t so he has all to keep it in tight.
“What he’s very good at is getting gamers to respect himimmensely, and also to trust him, and also to believe in him.
“I have no doubt in my mind that gamers love to play Cheik, since they feel like if they are going to lose, they’ll be disappointed they’ve let their coach down. And that is a great place to begin.
“He constantly challenges the status quo. He’s very good in saying,’why are we on the side of the changing room, and why do we do things like this?’ If there is not a reason he’ll challenge it and change it.
“That is the mindset he’s brought to this Australian team – significantly transforming their match just three months out from a World Cup.
“Many people are thinking,’my goodness, why would you do this?’ He’s probably thinking,’why didn’t wait so long?'”
Jones would rail against the concept he’s feeling under some pressure outside here, or any pressure that he’s not relishing.
However there were signs all the same – an irritability occasionally in his dealings with some parts of the media, people rips, albeit it blinked away, when talking about his hopes for the group at the beginning or the recent passing of his former Randwick coach and mentor Jeff Sayle.
Win on Saturday with the authority that the exact same team attained in the triumph over Ireland in Dublin in February, march on towards a probable semi-final meeting with the All Blacks having a staff that is healthy and firing, and he will feel as though the world is bending to his will again.
Fall brief, having put such a premium over the World Cup throughout his four irregular years accountable, and a few of the previous critiques will emerge : that his obsession with detail stands out his backroom staff and players, that his power of personality intimidates others in the team, that such certainty from one so vocal crowds out the creativity elsewhere.
“You can’t always have good form, and so Eddie will drive you,” says Mortlock.
“That occurred to me in around 2005, I had an average year. He and I agreed that I had but I stood up for myself and said,’it is my job to perform the work so that I can show that I am all set to go again’.
“And the moment I did that, it was like he was slapping me around the trunk and joking with me and everything else.
“He’s got a complete gentle heart when it comes to rugby. He is a pig in mud if he’s doing a heap of six-year-old kids or a coaching clinic with other coaches. He absolutely adores this game of ours”
Jones has endorsed himself. Now if he is ideal, England are about to find out.
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