'Some clown abused me going down the stairs at half-time' - Eddie Jones on his return to Twickenham

Eddie Jones had plenty to say following Japan’s defeat to England in their final Autumn Nations Series match, including Japan’s future, Marcus Smith’s performance and one “clown” in the England fanbase.

Speaking in front of his former enemies, the English press, Jones talked about his return to Twickenham, stating: “It wasn’t bad until some clown abused me going down the stairs at half-time. If there’s only one clown in 81,634 that’s not bad. I’m not going to repeat it here because I’ll get into trouble.”

Refusing to elaborate on what the ‘fan’ had said to him for fear of getting in trouble, Jones moved on to the recent allegations made about his coaching style in Danny Care’s new book, joking:

“‘I’ll tell you mate, I’ve got a new book deal. I just signed it today,'” said Jones. ‘It’s going to be called, ‘Caring about Care’ and you’ll get all the details. I’ve got pre-order forms up here, you can come up and get a pre-order form. Get them hot. I’m trying to do a deal with the Daily Mail, but we haven’t come to an agreement yet. If you want to read about it, there you go, it’ll be a good one. I’ll put a whole chapter in there ‘Caring about Care'”.

Many fans have been disappointed by Japan’s impact on international rugby within the past couple of years after such an impressive rise to the forefront of test rugby between 2015 and 2019. Since arriving back on the scene with Japan after stints with England and Australia, Jones hasn’t yet seen his side’s results improve. However, Eddie didn’t appear to be phased by the result, telling RugbyDump reporter Jack Tunney that the simple answer to solving his team’s problems is: time.

“There’s no magic solution” Eddie Jones tells me after Japan’s loss to England on Sunday pic.twitter.com/n5gFqNNtW7

— Jack Tunney (@JackTunneyRugby) November 25, 2024

“Time mate, and lessons like this. When you’ve got 200 caps, that means that most players have played 10 tests or less, so they don’t have any accumulated adaption on the field, so when something doesn’t go right they can’t adapt to it and you only learn that by doing it.

“I look at Marcus today, having brought him in when he was young, and now he’s so competent in his decision-making. He makes the right decisions most of the time, and he’s composed but he still has that bit of electricity.

“Now he’s 40 tests and that’s what you get from 40 tests so we’re just going to be patient and stick to the process and keep backing ourselves to be a bit different because we want to play differently, we want to play faster.

The former England and Wallaby boss concluded: “Yeah just stick to it mate, there’s no magic solution here”.