Leadership and coaching have been the important thing areas Wallabies coach Eddie Jones wished long-time rival Steve Hansen to take a look at however declared his World Cup involvement was extra like “a mate having a beer”.
Legendary All Blacks coach Hansen despatched New Zealand in to a spin when it was revealed he’d been lured in by Jones to hitch the Australian camp in France forward of pre-tournament conflict with the World Cup hosts.
Kiwi prime minister Chris Hipkins joked they need to cancel his citizenship and veteran All Blacks hooker Dane Coles mentioned he was gob-smacked and admitted it “hurt a bit” to see his former coach concerned with their arch rivals.
Hansen tried to calm his countrymen declaring he was solely advising for 3 or 4 days and Jones revealed he had referred to as on his good pal to get a recent perspective on the Wallabies in an informal and fewer formal approach.
“I‘ve coached against Steve since 1998 so we’ve got a long relationship, enjoy each other’s company and I always had the thought we wanted this week to be a reset week for us,” Jones mentioned from France on Tuesday evening.
“We‘ve been through the Rugby Championship, done our Australian responsibilities and now it’s a rest so we’ve brought in Steve to have a look at what we’re doing.
“It‘s purely like a mate having a beer (asking) ’What do you think? Where can we improve’?”
Jones mentioned he’d requested Hansen to forged his eye over particular areas.
“There‘s two main areas: there’s training quality, which is our way of improving, and leadership of the team,” he mentioned.
“So Steve is having a look at both of those areas.
“Every time he speaks there is some wisdom is what he says – when he says something, we are listening to him and how we can improve what we are doing, we are looking to see if we can use his advice to do that.”
Jones mentioned his gamers welcomed somebody of Hanson‘s calibre, who boasts the most wins of any All Blacks coach, keen to soak up his advice
“They like good people coming into camp, they want to get better and they can see the value of Steve,” Jones said.
“If you just look at his Test record, I think he‘s coached 200 Tests; for the All Blacks he won I think 87 per cent.
“So they like good people coming into camp and he‘s a good person, so the reaction has been really positive.”
Jones was unsure what France would dish up in their World Cup warm-up this weekend, with his young group keep to get more international exposure.
“Everything‘s about the World Cup – our target is the World Cup – so this is an opportunity for us to take another step forward,” Jones said.
“We‘re playing France but we might not be playing France.
“Whilst we‘re certainly not disregarding France, we’re not treating it as purely a coaching run, our goal is to get proper for the World Cup.”
Source: www.news.com.au
