Eddie Jones has warned his England side that they risk being blown out of their clash with New Zealand on Saturday before a ball has been kicked if they buy into the invincible All Blacks mantra, with the head coach challenging his players to “make the movie” of what would be an historic victory as opposed to simply starring in it.
England go into the second of their Quilter Internationals fully aware of the challenge in front of them, with New Zealand firmly at the top of the world rankings for close to a decade, but their never-say-die coach truly believes that they can follow up last weekend’s surprise win over South Africa with the biggest shock of all.
That’s because New Zealand rarely lose matches, and when they do, it kicks them into gear to push on to even greater highs. They have not lost two matches in a calendar year since 2008, so September’s stunning Rugby Championship encounter, where the Springboks defeated the All Blacks 36-34 in Wellington, may have succeeded only in prodding the beast that will now wreak havoc on the northern hemisphere.
With at least 16 players unavailable through injury and suspension – including the world class and incredibly unlucky Billy Vunipola – not even the most extravagant of scriptwriters could muster up an England win. But tell Jones that at your peril, with the 58-year-old adamant that his side are ready to go out and tear up the script in effort to record just the sixth victory over the All Blacks in their 92-year history.
“You can either make the movie or be in the movie, and we want to make the movie,” he said ahead of what is undoubtedly the biggest match of his England reign. “We don’t want to sit there and watch it, because that’s what happens when you play New Zealand sometimes, you sit there and you watch and you think ‘they’re the best team in the world, we can’t compete against them’.
“Thirty-three per cent of our players have beaten New Zealand, but understand like any team they’ve got weaknesses and we’ve got an opportunity to get at them. So we want to make the movie, we want to be film directors.
“(Other teams) sit there, they eat popcorn, have a can of Pepsi and they watch the movie. Then they realise ‘we can be in this’ but it’s too late, so we want to be sure we’re making the movie.”
Part of Jones’ plan to avoid that has been to respect what New Zealand rugby stands for – as well as his opposite number in good friend Steve Hansen – but to also not get sucked into the trap of thinking that the All Blacks are some sort of higher rugby power, incapable of losing, or feeling pain, or baring any form of weakness.
Often that all starts in the week’s press conferences. We saw that at great length last year when Hansen and Warren Gatland, then the Lions coach, engaged in a lengthy back-and-forth that eventually grew tiresome and stale, yet still dominated the pre-match headlines. Jones knows all about this, but more importantly how to avoid it. His record against the Kiwis when Australia boss showed five wins from 11 encounters – most crucially the 2003 Rugby World Cup semi-final falling in the Wallabies favour – as well as a Tri Nations double in 2001 when they clinched the Bledisloe Cup with an emphatic display at Carisbrook before backing it up on home soil.
Yet there has been no war of words this week, mainly due to Hansen and Jones holding great respect for each other. “It’s his job to be confident,” Hansen said this week, revealing that they speak to each other every fortnight at least. “You would expect him to be confident. He’s a passionate man, Eddie. I have got a lot of time for him, a lot of respect for him. He’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but I think he’s a good man.”
So that All Blacks aura is yet to engulf Twickenham and those within it, but the same cannot be said about game day. Kieran Read will lead his teammates through the golden gates at the famous stadium, scene of their memorable 2015 Rugby World Cup final triumph, and once they don the famous jersey minutes before kick-off, an intimidating fog will descend on the stadium in a matter of seconds.
It is more recognisably known as the ‘Haka’, when every one of the 23 players will grow a couple of inches, reveal the most threatening facial expression in their repertoire and channel their ancestors that epitomises the ferocious intensity that the All Blacks play every Test at.
“The haka…” Jones recalls. “I can always remember playing for New South Wales. We had a coach, I won’t name him, and he said ‘this haka boys, we’ve got to confront it. You have to find your opposite number and stand a nose-width away from him, look him in the eyes’.
“I remember Nick Farr-Jones – very educated, silver-spoon in the mouth, smart guy – he said, ‘we’re not doing that, that’s ridiculous’. And that’s what players were like in those days.
“We ended up getting beaten by 50 points. But I think today players see it all the time. It used to be such a unique thing but they’re used to it. It’s a familiarisation. We show respect and we get on with the game.
“If we’re good enough, then we beat them. If we’re not good enough then we work out how we can get good enough. That’s the thing.”
The Haka will almost certainly be drowned out by a 80,000-strong rendition of ‘Swing Low Sweet Chariot’, but that is all part of the spectacle that is England vs New Zealand. In 2014, that happened a saturated four times in the form of the summer Tests and autumn internationals. It has been a long, long wait for this fixture to come back around, but finally it is here, and deserves every millimetre of the top billing that it has been given.
All it needs now is for England to rise to the challenge and make a spectacle out of it, and if that is the case to spark the catalyst for Jones’ assault on the World Cup next year, the Hollywood version may not be that far down the line.
