mens
nations-championship
Eddie Jones planned a historic ambush England after the substrate Japan storm the Allianz Stadium on Saturday.
The Brave Blossoms have never beaten England in their six previous Test encounters and are 40-1 underdogs to cause a seismic upset in Nations Championship showdown.
But their wily Australian head coach Jones is preparing some curveballs for the team he has overseen from 2016 to 2022.
“It’s a big week for Japanese rugby,” Jones said. “We realize that England is a nation that we could never beat.
“Everyone knows the record and we want to do something a little different this week and that’s how we’ve been training, so I’m really happy with the team.
“We had a very good training to prepare us for the game we expect against England.
“We had two days of very organized and nice training, but Wednesday was quite dirty. We had to adapt to certain situations and in the end we did it very well.
“I was really pleased with the players, really pleased with their effort, really pleased with the way they adapted to the situation.
“I’m looking forward to going to Twickenham with this young Japanese team who are going to break down.”
Jones remains England’s most successful manager in terms of wins with 72 per cent and two wins Six Nations titles, including the Grand Slam in 2016, and guided the national team to the finals of the 2019 World Cup.
Nations Championship
North
P
W
L
D
PF
Well
PD
BP T
BP-7
BP
In total
1
4
3
1
0
17
2
4
3
1
0
15
3
4
3
1
0
15
4
4
2
2
0
11
5
4
2
2
0
10
6
4
0
4
0
0
South
P
W
L
D
PF
Well
PD
BP T
BP-7
BP
In total
1
4
4
0
0
20
2
4
4
0
0
20
3
4
1
3
0
8
4
4
1
3
0
7
5
4
1
3
0
5
6
4
0
4
0
0
“I spent seven good years there,” Jones said. “If you look at the stats, they stand the test of time. So there’s no reason why I wouldn’t be happy to come back to Twickenham.”
Japan: 15 Kazuma Ueda; 14 Kippei Ishida, 13 Dylan Riley, 12 Samisoni Tua, 11 Riku Tokito; 10 Riku Kitahara, 9 Naoto Saito (co-captain); 1 Yota Kamimori, 2 Mamoru Harada, 3 Shuhei Takeuchi, 4 Harry Hockings, 5 Warner Dearns (co-captain), 6 Ben Gunter, 7 Kanji Shimokawa, 8 Jack Cornelsen.
Replacements: 16 Kenji Sato, 17 Sojiro Otsuka, 18 Opeti Helu, 19 Michael Stolberg, 20 Tiennan Costley, 21 Shinobu Fujiwara, 22 Shinya Komura, 23 Jesus Lee.
