The Wallabies – and especially coach Eddie Jones – have been pilloried in the press after their dismal 40-6 defeat to Wales left Australia heading for an early exit from the World Cup in France.
After taking over in January, Jones has managed just one win from his eight games in charge, culminating in a grim loss to the Welsh that almost guarantees Australia a first-ever exit from the Rugby World Cup at the pool stage.
The reaction from the global media was swift and damning.
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Alex Lowe wrote in The Times: “This was a masterclass from Wales, who lost Dan Biggar to injury early in the game but dismantled every facet of Australia’s game until it became a humiliation for the Wallabies.”
Gareth Griffiths wrote for BBC: “The woeful Wallabies were humbled by Wales,” who delivered a “devastating display against an average Australia side.”
And Oliver Brown wrote in The Telegraph that it was a “truly abject surrender,” and a “capitulation to a Wales side who could scarcely believe the flimsy resistance.”
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Writing in The Telegraph, Oliver Brown was particularly critical of Australia’s wily coach.
“Eight months later, he has guided this team only to rank humiliation, with a first World Cup pool-stage exit in their history on the cards. Belatedly, his compatriots think they have been duped by someone who has talked a far better game than he has delivered.”
Writing in The Times, Alex Lowe declared: “They say never go back. In the case of Eddie Jones it is evidently true. Australia are being dragged down by the circus created by their head coach …”
Particularly targeted in the media was the revelation that Jones had been in talks with Japan over taking over their head coaching role next year, despite Jones being contracted with the Wallabies until the next World Cup in Australia in 2027.
Worse, those talks took place just days before the World Cup started.
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Lowe wrote: “The Australia players had woken up on match day to read reports that Jones had put himself forward for the Japan job even before this World Cup, despite having a five-year contract. There will be many down under who would be glad to see the back of him.”
Brown wrote: “You wonder what the younger players unaccustomed to Jones’ machinations are supposed to think. Here was a figure who had promised that they were the future, that he would be orchestrating his rebuild of Australian rugby around them.
“And yet before they had enjoyed a chance to achieve anything, or even to play a World Cup match, he was applying for a job with another country. Fittingly, they did not perform here as if they wished to play for him.”
Gareth Griffiths wrote for the BBC: “Welsh rugby has been like a soap opera for the last 12 months but all the pre-match drama and turmoil came within the Australia camp, with Jones clinging on to his job after this embarrassment.
“Jones was booed when he appeared on the big screen throughout the game, with Wales’ wonderful showing compounding his misery.”
Jones’ selection of a radically new-look an inexperienced side for this tournament has been heavily criticised, including by former Wallabies winger Drew Mitchell after the first defeat to Fiji in 69 years last week.
New Zealand dual international Sonny Bill Williams said on Stan Sport after the Wales defeat that the Wallabies: “were up against it from the start … questions need to be asked from selections to the mind games that Eddie’s been playing with these kids, these guys, these young men. It was evident – there’s a guy back home in the studios (Michael Hooper) that should be here right now.”
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The absence of Quade Cooper and Michael Hooper, among other shock omissions, were heavily criticised by the global media.
Brown wrote in The Telegraph: “Frankly, any notion of a Jones masterplan is wishful thinking, with the chaos at fly-half a telling illustration. Here is a man who, having jettisoned Cooper, a veteran of 79 Tests, thought it would be a shrewd ruse to bring 22-year-old Carter Gordon along for the adventure.
“When that backfired spectacularly, with Gordon culpable in a first loss to Fiji in 69 years, Jones turned instead to Ben Donaldson, a natural fullback who had started just one Test at 10 before this, against Wales last November. The plan unravelled hideously here, summed up when Donaldson kicked a restart out on the full.”
Eddie Jones is now under immense pressure after Australia’s worst-ever Rugby World Cup loss, and worst loss in history not just to Wales but to any Northern Hemisphere nation.
And while he hit back at journalists for asking about the Japan links in his post-match press conference, there’s significant concern over whether he is committed to the five-year rebuild he promised – and whether the players still believe in the coach.
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As Sonny Bill Williams said on Stan Sport post-game: “From a player’s point of view – I’m not following a guy that’s sitting, having a meeting with another national team potentially looking for another job days before you’re hopping on the plane to come to this world cup. That’s just my opinion.”
Brown wrote: “It is unconscionable that Jones carries on.”
He added: “If there is any chance of Jones taking [the] Japan job, Rugby Australia should pay for a one-way ticket to Tokyo themselves”.
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