It was not so long ago that the Rugby Football Union would host an annual Christmas bash. Executives, head coaches, assistants, members of staff and an invitation to the press pack. Mince pies and mulled wine, even a touch of merriment if we were lucky.
Eddie Jones would sometimes make an appearance, but the mind goes back to one year when he did not. To give him his due Steve Borthwick, his assistant at the time, did. He would probably rather have been anywhere else, but one of the more clear-eyed RFU employees, who had long-since figured out that the then forwards coach was destined for the top job, did their utmost to involve him.
Alas, Borthwick soon had a long-distance train to catch and hours of in-depth analysis on a laptop ahead of him. That anecdote feeds a narrative about England’s head coach. That he is astonishingly diligent when it comes to analysis, but struggles with the more human elements of the job.
Speak to anyone who has shared a dressing room with him and there are countless more. Equally, however, there is the time he surprised the 2023 World Cup squad by inviting their families to a training session and the compassion shown to Jamie George and Maro Itoje when his two captains were dealing with bereavements. The point here is that Borthwick is much more complex than the robotic stereotypes that persist.
Data-obsessed, yet a far more bold selector than his supposedly maverick predecessor. So, too, are his England side. The players queue up to defend him and his gameplan.
Yet they have produced their best performances when taking matters into their own hands and slipping the straitjacket. Even the RFU’s recent public pronouncements about Borthwick have vacillated. A vote of confidence after the historic Italy defeat was unprecedented and read like an ultimatum.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
