Steve Borthwick has his say on damning Care criticism of Eddie Jones

Steve Borthwick has distanced his England from the Eddie Jones regime damningly described by Danny Care, revealing he has an open door policy and encourages collaboration from his players. Care wrote in his autobiography, which is being serialised in The Times, that everybody was “bloody terrified” of “despot” Jones, who was England’s head coach from 2015 to 2022.

The 101-cap scrum-half, now retired from international rugby, added that players felt like “characters in a dystopian novel” because of the “toxic” methods used by Jones. Borthwick worked as an assistant coach under Jones with Japan and England before eventually replacing his former boss at Twickenham when he was sacked after a slump in results two years ago.

While declining to “talk about somebody’s experience” in reference to Care’s claims, Borthwick insisted that he has created a culture where his players are allowed their voices. When asked if he is challenged by his squad, Borthwick replied: “There are plenty of times where we have ideas and we discuss them. It’s almost on a daily basis.

“I’ll be chatting with players and bouncing ideas around and then things get moulded, adapted and improved. The players are the ones on the pitch who know the game better than anyone else. The best players are the best coaches and luckily we have some great, great minds in this group.

“In this autumn we have had a notable step forward in terms of the players speaking in team meetings, sharing their opinions. I’m trying to create an environment that is right for this group at this time. I finished (as forwards coach with) England very early in 2020 and now we are here in 2024.

“You can ask players and assistant coaches whatever you want to ask them about the environment now.”

Borthwick added that his England set-up is subject to regular oversight from Rugby Football Union chief executive Bill Sweeney and executive director of performance rugby Conor O’Shea, as well as being open to visitors from the wider game. “Bill and I speak every week either in person or on the phone. Bill was in camp last week and he’ll be in camp at the end of this week,” the former Leicester director of rugby said.

“Conor was in on Monday, he spent half a day in camp. The England U18s and U20s coaches have been in. There is a lot of interaction. Every Premiership club is very welcome to come in if they want to.”

England enter Saturday’s clash with Australia with the same starting personnel that fell to a 24-22 loss to New Zealand at Allianz Stadium. The only positional change to the XV sees Henry Slade and Ollie Lawrence swap midfield positions in the hope of inducing greater output in attack from the centres.

The bench returns to a five/three split between forwards and backs, with Luke Cowan-Dickie poised to make his first Test appearance for two years after displacing Theo Dan as replacement hooker. Ben Curry drops out of the 23 altogether, while Ollie Sleightholme is promoted as the third back.

George Ford missed a last-gasp drop goal against the All Blacks but Borthwick has blamed the set-up for the kick and not the substitute fly-half for the costly miss. “If you look at that series of plays, it starts from the scrum. Ultimately, they put pressure upon our scrum ball, which then eventually led to George being put under pressure,” he said.

“We didn’t give George the platform he required, so that is a frustration. It will be something we well do better in the future.”