England fly to Japan on Sunday under clear instructions from Eddie Jones to change the “whole course of history” by lifting the World Cup. Jones’s final message to his squad will be to urge them to emulate the triumphant class of 2003, with a reminder of the life-changing benefits that success can bring.
Jones’s squad head to Tokyo on the back of a 37-0 victory over Italy on Friday and hopeful that knocks picked up by Joe Launchbury and Luke Cowan-Dickie are minor. While it was a clunky performance England’s class eventually told and Jones quickly turned his attentions to finalising preparations in Japan before the opening match, against Tonga on Sunday 22 September.
Neither Mako Vunipola nor Jack Nowell will be available for the game in Sapporo, with Jones revealing both will miss the first two fixtures with hamstring and ankle injuries respectively, but England still board the plane with optimism in abundance.
This is Jones’s fourth World Cup campaign and he has tasted success before, having been a coaching consultant for the Springboks in 2007. Four years before that he was in charge of the Wallabies, who lost out to Sir Clive Woodward’s England side in the final, but Jones is planning to rake up those painful memories to inspire his squad.
“We’ve already spoken about [2003] and we may touch on it again,” said Jones. “They can become someone who changes the whole course of history. The number of kids playing … the impact on their lives, they obviously get status benefits, they get financial benefits and they get their own personal happiness so it’s pretty special. It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity. They can make history.”
Weather permitting with a typhoon hitting Japan this weekend, England will arrive in Tokyo on Monday before heading south to a training base in Miyazaki for “three or four days of reconditioning”. As disruptive as the extreme weather could be throughout the tournament, Jones revealed England have contingency plans in place if the typhoon affects their training plans, having organised indoor facilities with artificial turf.
“It will affect the World Cup, there is no doubt about it,” he added. “You just have to be able to ride with it, be adaptable and work out how you can escape with the situations that avail. You just can’t go outside. Once the typhoon comes it’s basically a lockdown. We have done a fair bit [of contingency planning]. We would have an idea of what we would do if there was a typhoon that stopped us training outside.”
Jones, you sense, would not mind too much if England were affected by the elements. Throughout their summer preparation he has thrown a number of curveballs at his side, ranging from deliberately making the team bus late en route to Twickenham before facing Ireland, to arranging a double training session in the Treviso heat this week to place them under fatigue against Italy.
“We’ve still got some way to go but I’m really pleased with the way that they’re tackling problems now,” added Jones. “Getting together and working it out. I think we’re in a good position [to win the World Cup] but we’ve got to keep improving. Preparation is still ongoing, it hasn’t finished yet.”
Jones has also been desperate to develop what he calls the “social cohesion” of his squad, to improve players’ relationships with each other. It explains why he wasted no time in discarding Ben Te’o after his altercation with Mike Brown in Treviso and why, despite that, he is still encouraging his players to embrace social events. “We’re going to have a night in Tokyo,” said Jones. “Then we will fly out to Miyazaki and have three or four days or reconditioning and then start training next Saturday. We just want them to get them out and about.”
England’s last overseas World Cup campaign – in New Zealand eight years ago – was plagued by off-field problems including the dwarf-throwing incident in Queenstown and Manu Tuilagi’s ferry jump in Auckland. Ben Youngs is one four surviving members of the 2011 squad and recent headlines about his Leicester teammates being involved in a bar brawl on a pre-season trip in Portugal again highlighted the potential for off-field pitfalls. The scrum-half insisted however, that England will not be adopting monastic lifestyles. “We’ve addressed the elephant in the room and spoken about how off-field stuff can bring unneeded attention that affects momentum,” he said.
“Sometimes guys will get it wrong but in this group I think guys will look out for each other. We want to see Japan and have downtime. If guys want to have a drink, that’s not a problem. The guys will police each other and make sure everyone makes the right decision.”
England in 2019
W 2 Feb Ireland a 32-20 Six Nations
W 10 Feb France h 44-8 Six Nations
L 23 Feb Wales a 13-21 Six Nations
W 9 Mar Italy h 57-14 Six Nations
D 16 Mar Scotland h 38-38 Six Nations
W 2 May Barbarians h 51-43 International
W 11 Aug Wales h 33-19 WC warm up
L 17 Aug Wales a 6-13 WC warm up
W 24 Aug Ireland h 57-15 WC warm up
W 6 Sept Italy h 37-0 WC warm up
First RWC Pool C match
22 Sept TongaSapporo 11.15am