Eddie Jones went looking for the positives despite Australia losing for the fifth straight game under his new reign, beaten 41-17 by France in their World Cup warm-up international on Sunday to leave the Wallabies with their backs to the wall for next month’s tournament.
Jones took over as coach in January, not long after being fired by England, but since his arrival, they have lost to South Africa, Argentina, New Zealand twice and now the hosts in the last of the preparatory test before the World Cup kicks off on Sept. 8.
“The final score is important, don’t get me wrong, but we are aiming higher than this game,” Jones told reporters after the game at the Stade de France, where they will return on Sept. 9 for their first Pool C clash against Georgia.
“It was a pleasure to be there but we still have work to do before the World Cup, especially the first match. We did some good things, we have to continue to progress. We are not a bad team. We are not a good team yet but we are improving. We tried to play differently but I appreciated the way the guys never gave up,” said Jones.
Jones made radical changes to the squad ahead of the tournament and never short of self confidence said he believed his approach was on the right track.
“Obviously we’d like to have a better win/loss record but we’ve re-estabilised the team. We’ve taken away all the leadership that was there previously. We’ve got a new leadership team in place. We’re trying to play a different way,” he added.
“The results haven’t been good. It hasn’t been good enough. I’m not hiding away from that but we do have a longer-term plan in terms of the World Cup and that’s what we’re here for.”
Jones insisted many players had shown improvements and singled out the performance of the front five.
“Our scrum probably finished on top and the lineout was good. I thought the way we were able to negate France’s defence was pretty good. We just didn’t execute it well enough,” he added.
Australia, who were World Cup winners in 1991 and 1995, also share their opening round pool with Fiji, Portugal and Wales and will be expected to advance to the knockout stages.
Photo by EPA/KIM LUDBROOK
