From the highs of last December to a fifth place finish in March.
Eddie Jones led England to their third Six Nations title in five attempts, late last year, but he once again finds himself under pressure.
The England head coach has often had a testy relationship with the media and did not help matters much by describing some of their stories as “rat poison” before the Ireland game.
Following his side’s 32-18 defeat to a fired up Ireland, Jones was involved in several tetchy exchanges in the post-game briefing.
Jones started off by paying tribute to his honest and hard-working team before congratulating and Ireland side that ‘were too good for us on the day’.
He denied that his team is going backwards and argued that all his team need to discover is some consistency. Asked if Ireland surprised him, Jones remarked:
“No, we felt they’d come pretty hard at us through the front door, mate. Given the previous results between the teams we knew they wanted to settle the physical stakes particularly. We thought they’d come hard, we thought they’d kick a lot, which they did and they did it very well, mate.”
What then followed were a series of short, sharp responses to different English reporters, starting with an enquiry if Ireland got their tactics right:
JONES: They got their tactics right, yeah and the scoreboard indicates that.
REPORTER: Do you feel there is a bit of a disconnect between the team and supporters
JONES: I don’t think that’s the case, mate, I don’t know what you are talking about.
REPORTER: On Whatsapp and social media, much of the comments are negative
JONES: I don’t know mate, I can’t comment on it.
REPORTER: What has to change?
JONES: We need to assess where we are going. I said all along we are going through transition and this is almost a natural time for that to happen, almost two years to a World Cup. Those things will happen.
REPORTER: Is that a case of tactics, or is it personnel?
JONES: bit of both, mate.
REPORTER: Are you still able to get through to players?
JONES: Yeah, most definitely, I don’t think that’s the issue. If it was the issue, I wouldn’t be the coach of the team.
The England coach wrapped up by saying Ireland were never going to play the same open style that the French did, last Saturday, at Twickenham.
“This was always going to be a tight, attritional game at the Aviva Stadium,” he concluded, “and we started well and let a few things disappoint us and we got away from it and allowed Ireland to get on the front foot.”
