Any meeting, whether its first time or the act of reacquainting, is a journey into the unknown with Eddie Jones.
The Springboks will venture into the realm of the latter when they run out against Jones’s Wallabies at Loftus Versfeld in their Rugby Championship opener next weekend.
The last time they left the field, it is worth noting, was in glorious triumph against Jones’s England team at Twickenham last November.
That defeat proved to be the final nail in the Australian’s coffin in charge of the Red Roses.
That, however, was not the first time he lost his job after his team suffered at the hands of a South African juggernaut. Back in 2007 Jones brought his Queensland Reds team to Loftus Versfeld in damage limitation mode. The Reds had had a disappointing season and they were well aware the Bulls were in stampede mode as they held out slim hopes of reaching the Super Rugby semifinals. The Bulls ended up overwhelming the Reds 92-3, the biggest margin of defeat in that competition.
It left Jones to ruefully remark afterwards: “Mate, we dropped our bundle.”
If for some of Jones’s critics those crushing defeats came a stinging rebuke of his coaching methods, they had better remember the Australian is quite adept at picking himself up from the floor.
Just over four months after that defeat to the Bulls, Jones was in the Springboks’ dressing room as technical director to Jake White as they stampeded their way to 2007 Rugby World Cup in France.
Jones later remarked that it was one of his greatest experiences in the game. Several Boks heaped lavish praise on Jones’s input in their march to the title. Fourie du Preez, who was at the peak of his powers during that tournament, emphatically stated the Boks might not have lifted the Webb Ellis Trophy had it not been for the Australian’s tactical nous and calmness.
Eddie always plays one or two mind games and he thinks out of the box. He is the kind of guy that has the guts to do stuff like that. I don’t say ‘mind games’ in a negative way. He is really good at doing it for his own team.
— Rassie Erasmus
The climax of the 2019 RWC brought more strife for Jones in Japan, a country he holds so dear.
After that chastening defeat many suggested Jones had reached the end of the road with England. The canvas, however, is not a surface on which the wily coach chooses to dwell and soon he plotted and schemed England to a triple Crown en route to the Six Nations title.
But as much as Jones is a tactician, he is a verbal technician. He is a shrewd, rather than smooth operator. There is a spikiness to him that rubs some up the wrong way, but ultimately Jones is about getting his point across.
Rassie Erasmus, SA Rugby’s director of rugby, labels the well travelled Jones as a coach who has always sought to broaden his coaching horizons.
“Eddie always plays one or two mind games and he thinks out of the box,” noted Erasmus, who indubitably found it a lot easier to air his views more publicly after his stint with Munster.
“He is the kind of guy that has the guts to do stuff like that. I don’t say ‘mind games’ in a negative way. He is really good at doing it for his own team.
“I don’t think it is a bad thing. It is actually entertaining for sport.”
Erasmus knows, for all the perceived bluster some might think emanates from Jones, there is always broader picture and an end goal.
Erasmus also knows Jones is on an assignment in which the odds are long but not insurmountable. He took the Bok job well inside two years of the 2019 RWC, Jones now has half that time with the Wallabies.
Jones’s assignment is to mount the Wallaby and in a matter of months ride it from Pretoria to Paris. There might be the odd crash, burn or both, but one thing is for sure, it won’t just be the Wallabies who are in for a helluva ride.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.