The Most Miserable Coaching Tenure in Rugby History

The Most Miserable Coaching Tenure in Rugby History
Dive into the tumultuous journey of Eddie Jones during his time with the Wallabies in the lead up to and during the 2023 Rugby World Cup. We'll explore the highs, the lows, and everything in between, providing an overview of one of the most controversial periods in recent Rugby history.

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Corrections:
The last Australian team won super rugby in 2014 not 2011

#Rugby #Wallabies #EddieJones #RugbyHistory #ConnorDoesRugby

[johannrugby]

There were Australian teams who won Super Rugby after 2011, remember WHAT THE WARATAHS did in 2014?

[casperredsman]

I was keeping in the biggest “I told you so” for people happy to get Eddie back. His last tenure here ended in failure and started the 20 year nosedive we’ve been on. Why anyone ever thought going back to Eddie in the first place was a good idea has me absolutely stumped. I’m at the point where I doubt if Eddie Jones was EVER good

[markkane]

At England, Eddie was the beneficiary of fortuitous timing - he benefitted from the years of groundwork put in by Stuart Lancaster and his coaching team in developing the players that were ready-made to star for England under Eddie. Luckily Ireland managed to pick up the coaching team hastily discarded by the RFU - Stuart Lancaster for Leinster, Andy Farrell and Mike Catt for Ireland and Graham Rowntree for Munster - who have all gone on to deliver success. Rugby Australia and the RFU share a similar malaise - the blazers at the top, as the saying goes, a fish starts to stink at the head.

[YOUSEFTECALB]

It says a lot when the Jaguares won more games in New Zealand during their short time in Super Rugby than the Aussie teams have done since the Jaguares were booted out.

Great video mate. Seeing you're Scottish, I would love to see you do a video on the issues of youth development in Scotland, but I fear that might drive you to tears. 😅

[NickWasiliev_Official]

Great video mate, bar the small footnote that the Tahs won in 2014.
I cannot emphasise it being such a small footnote, because since 2015 it has been a disaster here. The saddest part is though that the lack of investment and planning is coming back to bite us hard, plus the rugby politics in Australia kneecaps any potential. It doesn't feel like we can turn things around. It feels like it is only going to get worse.

[holcable]

Pretty great video. One mention is the Rugby League players you referenced who "turned to League" to go professional played League their whole life and only played Union in High School. In Australia the cashed up Rugby Union playing private schools scout the best League juniors to come play for them via scholarships. Most continue playing League throughout High School with their junior clubs and/or NRL representative sides and simply continue with these teams once school is finished.

[davesmith]

The real question is not why did Australia hire Eddie Jones, but why did Australia get the nod for the 2027 World Cup? They've done nothing to deserve it. They were instrumental in driving the South Africans out of the Pro 14 and they've brought nothing new or innovative to the international test game. The South Africans were supposed to host this year's World Cup but the French got it in a clear case of sporting corruption. They should have been given the 2027 rights, not least because they've only hosted the competition once and won it four times.

[tombutcher]

No fans or pundits were excited. Sorry Rennie was done over and on the NH tour they had some close losses along with 14 first choice players injured or unavailable.
Aussies were on an upward curve. Eddie with his contacts bailed on England and had theAussie job lined up.
Eddie messed up many careers did not develop players injured players in training and stopped attacking. Not to mention Selected favourites and fell out with a load of very good coaches.
2019 yes we got to the final, but before that England was on a downward trajectory attacking and selection. 2019 made Eddie look good. I respect him wanted him until 2018 where he clearly ran out of ideas.
Why Aussies got rid of Rennie is beyond me.

[JKMeZmA]

Think RA are absolutely in shambles. Feel so bad for Dave Rennie, and Eddie Jones was a great coach, but is an absolute liability, and has caused such an impact on the hope for the wallabies, and he really did break them. I’d be really keen to see a proper replacement coach, who can change the systems in RA and get some solid structure in that area. Someone like a Joe Schmidt, Vern Cotter, Jamie Joseph, Graham Rowntree, or Stuart Lancaster. Genuinely transformative leadership ya know? I know coaches don’t change the overall systems, but true professionalism could give them the chance to build it to something better.

[Caledon]

Good video mate. Worth mentioning Eddie's duplicitous conduct during interviews, speaking to Japan while coaching Australia then lying about it shows he has no integrity.

[stephenpage-murray]

Rugby is a very minor game in Australia. Roughly half the country doesn’t even know it exists!

[TheTherealbadboy]

2:16 " one of the biggest names in Aussie rugby,

Id say thats one of the biggesr names in the world let alone aussuw rugby

[noelburland]

I think you have covered most of the issues facing rugby in Australia well. They have well and truly hit rock bottom and have a lot of work to do to repair the damage done in time for the British and Irish Lions tour next year and the World Cup in three and a half year's time.

Of course Eddie Jones will cop a lot of the blame for seemingly single-handedly destroying the Wallabies, but things were going south long before he was snatched up by RA after being sacked by the RFU in England. The RA Board aren't investing enough in the grassroots and former Chairman Hamish McLennan seemed only interested in spending 1.6 million AUD luring a league player over to union and being a constant thorn in the sides of his business partners, even going as far as publicly airing his dirty laundry in an effort to make them look bad.

I've heard that RA were unwilling to meet Jones' stipulations when hired, specifically around investing more in the grassroots. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why he took such an inexperienced squad to France? Maybe he wanted them to bomb out early to make the board members in RA wake up? Jones clearly had limited tolerance of his now former employers, but his own hubris got the better of him when it was revealed he had had a meeting with the Japan Rugby Union prior to the World Cup. He allegedly denied it 14 times to the media before he quit the Wallabies and was later unveiled as returning to the brave blossoms for a second stint there.

[handcrafted]

This is a great video. I’d love to see a video comparing similar numbers on rugby engagement for other countries. There was a bbc doco recently that have similar 50% drops in people playing the game across a 10yr period. A video dedicated to rugby engagement across countries would be awesome.

[simonkevnorris]

I grew up in Perth (WA) but moved to the UK in 1989. At that point rugby was really only played professionally in New South Wales and Queensland. If that is still the case then I presume the available population for rugby is limited.

[AlanHughes-ws]

The drop in attendance may be to do with how boring the game has become, endless scrum recycling, kickers taking forever to kick conversions and penalties, obscure rules which lead to players being sent off and most spectators not knowing why.

[burrowssj]

EJ is a disgrace. The coach that came in after his first stint said he had never seen a bunch of men so depleted in his coaching years. He also expressed his disappointment immediately after EJ second appointment. I think the best thing is to start at the grassroots again, make rugby a sport young people want to play and incentivize them to do so, start giving out prize money to teams who win the local comps, start giving resources to the grassroot coaches and scholarships etc. Get it into public schools and incentivize the schools to have good rugby programs by rewarding them with prize money, base money earnt on performance and give bonuses to teams that excel. Sell it as an international sport that is rewarding for young talents to pick. As great as NRL and AR is, they're not international games, the future is much brighter for these guys if they know they can go overseas and earn mega bucks and still play for ARU. The other thing is, stop basing your success on if you can beat the ABs.

[winna]

Nice video mate! I remember going to Tahs/Wallabies games as a young fella when the likes of Wendell Sailor and Peter Hewitt were running around. The crowds were generally pretty massive. Fast forward to a couple of years ago we played the Poms at the SCG, semi full house with ZERO atmosphere. The game is dying a slow death in Aus, the NRL dominates NSW and QLD, whilst the AFL dominates the rest of the country. Nobody watches or talks about the Wallabies anymore. Sad!

[ErnestJHobbs]

Remember how often he said he was "committed to Rugby Australia"...?

[Samizouza]

The new HPU guy RA hired should help alot, especially after a makeover from the top down.