Ben Youngs: The 'main England difference' between Borthwick, Jones

Centurion Test scrum-half Ben Youngs has revealed what he claims to be the main England difference now that Steve Borthwick has succeeded Eddie Jones as head coach. Jones was dismissed in December after his team registered just five wins in a dozen 2022 matches and was replaced by Leicester boss Borthwick, his former Japan and England assistant.

There was no immediate bounce in the results as England posted a two-wins-from-five-outings return for the third successive Guinness Six Nations campaign, but record men’s caps holder Youngs has explained how very different the team environment was this year.

“One of the things Steve did straight away was make sure all the rugby stuff was done at the training centres, so no meetings are ever done at the hotel or in the hotel area,” said Youngs during an appearance on the latest Rugby Pod ahead of this Friday’s Leicester trip to Dublin to take on Leinster in the Heineken Champions Cup quarter-finals.

“Everything is done at the base, at the training centre. So, when you are at the hotel, you’re at the hotel and you’re relaxed and it is downtime. When you are there (at the training centre), it is work. How it was under Eddie before, you’d train, we have all our meetings in the hotel, have catch-ups at the hotel, have unit meetings.

“You might be going down for breakfast and suddenly you are sort of grabbed as they need a quick chat, can you review something with a coach or can you look at this. Or you are about to go for dinner and it’s, 'Have you got five minutes? You need just look at this'. That is very different now. If we are there, we’re there, whereas before it was both.

“I guess that maybe led on to some boys potentially always feeling, ‘Oh, I’m about to get grabbed and suddenly have to go into a meeting’. So you never truly switched off. But Steve is so thorough and incredibly diligent, and he is aware of anything like that, so that is probably why one of the reasons why he was, ‘Right, we work here, we do all our work here but when in the hotel you are done, you switch off, you use that as an escape’.

“Test week, it’s high pressure, intense, and you can’t carry that 24/7 all the week long. You have got to be able to do it, park it, rest up be ready to go again – that was probably the big difference.”

As regards the respective coaching styles of Borthwick and Jones, Youngs claimed: “Similar philosophies but sort of different at the same time. The stricter schedule and everything like that is completely different to how it was under Eddie. Steve was probably aware of when he comes he didn’t want it to feel the same, he needed it to feel different and he did a great job of doing that.

“Steve is very evidence and data-based and Eddie was probably more feel. Eddie was an incredible coach and I have no doubt he will do well with Australia. What Steve did essentially, a bit similar to what he did at Leicester really, he comes in and had to start with the foundations and build the philosophy of how we want to play and build the culture and that takes time.

“At club level, you are in every day, every day you get an opportunity to work on something and develop that but when you are an international coach you have such a small window to do that. You have 33 blokes in on Sunday to Tuesday and then they go, and you are left with the 23, 24 and then even the mini-camps midweek during the tournament, they are even less players in that.

“So it’s a difficult challenge because you are building foundations, building the culture and all that but your time is so limited. That is why the World Cup camp, Richard (Wigglesworth) going in and Aled (Walters), all those guys and the team together I’m sure will make up so much ground in terms of those foundations, the cultures, ethos, all those things that need doing that take time – you are in every day and it will accelerate very quickly.”

A selection favourite under Jones, Youngs only made a single appearance for Borthwick (off the bench in the round one loss to Scotland). Jack van Poortvliet, his Leicester colleague, instead started all five matches but Youngs doesn’t bear any grudges.

“No there isn’t (any awkwardness). Honestly, there isn’t. You can always compare and be, ‘Oh I can do this and he can do that’. But at the end of the day, it is what can I do. And do you know what, the only thing I could do was go back to the club and play well and I felt like I did that. I felt like I contributed to the run of results, and I really enjoyed just being at the club,” he said, adding that the feedback from Borthwick and co was clear.

“The clarity that you get from coaches is always very, very clear and if it isn’t then you go and seek it. But Steve has always been very clear, chats have always been positive. After Scotland, I wasn’t involved for the rest of the tournament but was there Sunday to Tuesday trying to put my best foot forward.

“Also having worked with Steve for three years he knows how I am as a person, as a player, what I can do and obviously I know his game plan very well as do a lot of the lads who were under him at Leicester. It was more just getting what I need to do, what can I do and move from there really. But it was always very clear, a lot of the time positive."