Attack to be mantra of Eddie Jones's England ahead of Six Nations

The new England coach’s first squad will reflect his desire to play a fast, running game

New England coach Eddie Jones (Getty)

England’s new head coach, Eddie Jones, will name a long squad of 33 players on Wednesday, to cover the Six Nations’ Championship in February and March, the May match with Wales at Twickenham and the summer tour to Jones’s homeland, Australia.

Those are the nuts and bolts. The grease in England’s wheels will come from Jones and his playing philosophy honed over more than two decades coaching around the world, and set for its first test in the ultra-parochial Six Nations in Scotland in just four weeks’ time.

Jones has recruited Paul Gustard, the king of Saracens’ self-styled “wolf pack”, to recast England’s defence. Steve Borthwick will work full-time with the forwards, including the line-out, and Ian Peel will scrutinise the scrum part-time, on Thursdays in non-Test weeks and each Tuesday before a match. But it will be the 55-year-old Jones who will dominate England’s style and – pending a possible post-Six Nations appointment of another assistant – shape their attack.

There is scope for a large-scale overhaul, with Jones able to change almost half the players who contested the World Cup in September and October. The elite player agreement allows 10 alterations to the senior squad on form at this halfway stage of the season, while the return of Sam Burgess to rugby league created another vacancy and the injured incumbents Jonny May, Henry Slade and Kieran Brookes need immediate cover.

Anyone omitted now will have begun the run to the 2019 World Cup on the wrong foot, to say the least. It would be no shock if the call-ups included Elliot Daly, the thrusting Wasps centre, and young forwards such as Jack Clifford, Maro Itoje and Josh Beaumont, whereas the recall of Dylan Hartley from purgatory might be at one end of the predictable spectrum, with the 34-year-old Saracens tighthead Petrus du Plessis at the other.

But what are Jones’s likely criteria? Consulting some of his past players and colleagues has offered a few clues. George Smith is currently giving a No 7 masterclass at Wasps, and he played in Jones’s Super Rugby-winning Brumbies team in 2001, as well as alongside a fellow openside flanker in Phil Waugh in Jones’s Australia side beaten by England in the 2003 World Cup final. Those teams had big, ball-carrying No 8s in Jim Williams and David Lyons, and more recently Jones’s Japan fielded a similar player in Amanaki Mafi.

“Eddie is very much a running, ball-in-hand coach,” said Smith, who won Japanese league titles with Jones at Suntory Sungoliath in 2011 and 2012. “Michael Leitch for Japan was fantastic at scavenging at the breakdown, so there was a degree of what [David] Pocock and [Michael] Hooper did as a pair for Australia recently, and Waugh and myself in ’03.

“In the English Premiership, a few players can fulfil the scavenger role – [Matt] Kvesic at Gloucester, and Clifford at Harlequins, and I’ve been pleased at the development of James Haskell at my club, winning balls at the breakdown after involving himself in tackles. But the No 7 internationally also has to spot an opportunity with ball in hand and link between backs and forwards.”

By that yardstick, Brendon O’Connor of Leicester and Saracens’ Will Fraser are contenders, while the 22-year-old Clifford’s ability across the back row offers an option at both openside and No 8, where Billy Vunipola is in possession of the shirt. Chris Robshaw, Ben Morgan and Tom Wood are feeling the heat from a new wave of back-rowers, including Beaumont of Sale and eventually Nathan Hughes, the No 8 who qualifies for England in the summer and, like Haskell, has just extended his contract at Wasps. “Eddie did a good job developing back-row ball-carriers,” said Smith. “Hendrik Tui for Japan was another.”

When Jones was hired by South Africa as an assistant for the 2007 World Cup, which the Springboks went on to win, the Aussie put a job with Saracens on hold. But Jones eventually completed two stints in London, for a few months in 2006 and again in the 2008-09 season. Neil de Kock was Saracens’ first-choice scrum-half in the second spell.

“Eddie has an attacking mindset, quick and fast,” said De Kock. “No 15 will be an important position for him, one of his generals. And his Brumbies were pioneers in creating attacking moves.”

Jones’s inside-centres in 2008-09 included Andy Farrell and a then 22-year-old newcomer in Brad Barritt, both renowned for defensive atrributes. More often, Jones has used fly-halves as second ball-players at No 12, such as Elton Flatley, Pat Howard, Rod Kafer and Matt Giteau. With the brilliant Slade injured, there may be a revival of the 10-12 combination of George Ford and Owen Farrell. Concurring with that view is Andy Friend, who was skills coach to Jones’s Brumbies and technical adviser to Jones’s Wallabies, and is about to take over Australia’s sevens team. Friend was also head coach at Harlequins when full-back Mike Brown and scrum-half Danny Care were youngsters adopting a Jones-style, fast, offloading game.

“Eddie’s rugby schooling was at the Randwick club,” said Friend, “which is all about ball in hand – and if you haven’t got it, getting it back with forwards, predominantly sevens. His nines need to be playing at pace, challenging defensive lines. The 2019 World Cup in Japan will be on hard grounds, so he’s going to want someone at 12 who can play. He will only change style if he really has to – he did it with Japan, against the Maori last year, after they’d been absolutely towelled trying to run in the first match.”

Jones has said he wants his England hookers to hook, not just push, to help keep defences guessing, and he has told this paper he likes a “worker and a finisher” as his wings. “He demands a lot of his back three,” said Friend. “He won’t allow them not to be fit and not to be moving.”

With Jones, Borthwick, Gustard, Peel and around 10 Saracens players, including a possibly recalled Chris Ashton, in the England squad, there will be a strong connection with the reigning Premiership champions. But De Kock said: “I am certain it will be an England mindset under Eddie, not a single-club mindset. I’m excited for England.”