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Alex Coles may have feared the entry of Eddie Jones England is camping for the first time, but he credits the Australian’s great love for starting his Test career.
Jones takes his Japan on Saturday at the Allianz Stadium with the aim of engineering a seismic upset against the side he coached from 2016 to 2022.
Coles will appear in the Nations Championship clash, who has become an integral part of Steve Borthwick’s pack since nailing down a second-row starting spot on the 2025 summer tour.
But it was another matter when Jones called him up as a 23-year-old rookie in 2022, hoping to impress the demanding master but nervous about what lay ahead during a fall in which he ended up winning his first three starts.
“It was scary coming in at that time,” Coles said. “As a young player coming through and you didn’t experience it, you heard all these stories about Eddie.
“I was definitely scared and he definitely had that aura around him, you felt a little uneasy around him.
“But I am so grateful to him because at that stage of my career I didn’t really believe that I was ready for that level.
“He saw something in me and made me believe I could be at that international level and made me work on my game.
“Even though I dropped out of the team for a bit after that, without him seeing that it would take a lot longer in me to get to the point where I was ready to play international rugby.”
New Zealand it was the only match of the 2022 autumn campaign in which Coles was denied, but he nevertheless played a key role in the team’s preparation for the 25–25 draw that ensued. A week later he returned to the starting XV.
“We talked about New Zealand trying to get into our heads and spin us and my only role in one training session was just to try and spin the starters,” Coles said.
“I was like this fresh-faced 22-year-old, scared of all the older heads like Mako Vunipola and Owen Farrell.
“And Eddie would just run behind the defensive line and say, ‘You’re not cheering them on enough, you’re not getting into their heads’.
“So I ended up walking around the edge of the track because I ran out of ideas and tackled someone who was the third man in the track lunch.
“Then I was overwhelmed on the floor by four or five starters. After that Eddie said I trained really well!”
Jones was sacked at the end of that autumn, paying the price of a continued decline in results and deteriorating relations with the Rugby Football Union, although he remains England’s most successful manager in terms of a winning percentage of 72 per cent.
“I hope he gets a warm welcome on Saturday because he played a big part in the history of English rugby,” Coles said.
“You can compare him to football manager Jose Mourinho and people like that who bring their own kind of aura, some controversy and polarisation. It adds to the narrative and the spectacle of the game.”
