Eddie Jones immediately set his sights on what he described as England’s “most important game of the year” against Ireland next Saturday after watching his side clinch a six-try win over Georgia to kickstart their Autumn Nations Cup campaign.
Jamie George became the first England hooker in history to score a hat-trick while Jack Willis grabbed the first try on his debut with Elliot Daly and Dan Robson also going over in a 40-0 victory – only the second time in his tenure Jones’s side have kept the opposition scoreless.
Jones said afterwards that England had wanted to take the game to Georgia up front, given their opponents arrived with a ferocious scrummaging reputation, with memories of February’s brawl during a training session between the two sides in Oxford still fresh.
Conditions ensured that England’s attacking display was far from vintage but the 40-point win puts them top of their Autumn Nations Cup pool with matches against Ireland next weekend and Wales the following week to come.
Two weeks ago England went to Rome and claimed the bonus-point victory to deliver the Six Nations title but with Ireland fresh from a 32-9 win over Wales on Friday night, and set to arrive at Twickenham looking to avenge a 24-12 defeat in February, Jones believes Saturday’s contest is their most significant match since last year’s World Cup final defeat by South Africa.
“We realise the Ireland game is going to be the most important game of the year,” said Jones. “So we’ll go away and have a good preparation. Ireland will be cock‑a‑hoop after their big win against Wales so they’ll come with plenty of confidence and swagger. We played Georgia which produced a challenge at the set piece. I thought our set-piece cohesion was absolutely outstanding. We always want to win the forwards’ battle, especially up against Georgia.
“All the guys remember the session against Georgia in Oxford, it was one of those things when you sit down and talk about scrummaging, Georgia comes to mind. Even the backs got involved in that session, they ran from about 40 metres away to have a go. So we wanted to make a point today that we won’t be stood over and we did that. We probably left another 20 points out there but we are pretty happy with the display. I was delighted with the resolve and attitude of the side. Ireland will be a completely different game. I’d like us to execute a bit better.”
England lost Jonathan Joseph just before half-time to a back injury but Jones was “cautiously optimistic” he will be fit to face Ireland. Joseph impressed on the wing, having previously been deployed there against Andy Farrell’s side in February. Jones was also pleased with Willis’s debut performance – the openside flanker scoring England’s first try from close range in an all-action 47 minutes before he was replaced by Ben Earl. Max Malins also won his first cap off the bench, taking the number of Test debutants this autumn to six.
Jones added: “We are trying to create depth in every position. Jack [Willis] and Max [Malins] showed they are capable of playing test rugby, so now they have to fight hard to keep getting selected. We’ve got a good number of young players coming through and there were six new caps since we’ve started playing again. They’ve got to keep working and pressing if they want to stay in the squad.”
George meanwhile, said he was “embarrassed” with his historic achievement, finishing off three driving mauls for his hat-trick but admitted that England’s attacking performance will need to improve next week. He said: “It was a big pat on the back for our forward pack. We probably didn’t put our stamp on the game with regards to our attack but conditions didn’t really allow us to do so.
“It was always going to be a tough one for us but at the same time, to keep a team like Georgia down to nil and put in the professional-like performance that we did, was really pleasing. I think we are going to move on pretty quickly to Ireland and make sure our focus is on that as they have been pretty impressive since the restart.”
