Eddie Jones blamed England’s defeat to Argentina on ‘silly mistakes’
(Picture: Getty Images)Eddie Jones has told England to relish coming “under the pump” in the wake of Sunday’s chastening 30-29 Autumn Nations Series defeat by Argentina at Twickenham.
The Pumas toppled England at Twickenham for only the second time in history, to add to their 2006 west London triumph.
Argentina’s Australian boss Michael Cheika claimed his first-ever Test win over old friend, compatriot and adversary Jones, on a frustrating day for England.
Emiliano Boffelli booted six penalties and claimed a fine try, with Santiago Carreras racing in after scooping up a loose ball. Joe Cokanasiga and Jack van Poortvliet crossed for England, with Owen Farrell posting two conversions and five penalties, but the hosts fell short and battled with unforced errors all day.
Jones insisted England are unfazed by the loss, pledging to tidy up the litany of mistakes in double-quick time. England host Japan at Twickenham on Saturday, with Jones predicting a vastly different showing next weekend.
“It was a frustrating game, I thought at times we played really well – but then we made some elementary mistakes, some individual mistakes that kept on inviting them back into the game,” said Jones.
“They got the intercept try which gave them a bit of breathing space. So it’s hard to put your finger on it.
“But it’s a great opportunity for us now, because we’re under the pump a bit, which is good, and I think we’ll respond really well, so I’m looking forward to it.
“I’m not concerned at all, because I reckon we play that game 100 times and maybe the result’s not going to be the same. We don’t have to worry about confidence, that’s about repeating things well.
“We did enough good things out there. We did some silly things as well, and sometimes that can happen when you try too hard.
“The attitude and determination to be the best we can be is really good, and sometimes that manifests itself in mistakes.
“We’ve got to tidy it up a bit but we made enough line breaks to win probably two games, but we just didn’t finish them off.”
Jones revealed he felt no need to step onto the combative front foot with the media, purely because he felt relaxed about England’s overall performance despite the defeat.
“Look, I’m not sitting here thinking we’ve got really strong problems within the team,” said Jones.
“For most of the part I thought we dominated the game. If I didn’t think we dominated most of the game, I’d be thinking these blokes have got a good right to get stuck into us, and then we’d have a bit of a fight.
“But I don’t need a fight today, because I feel like the team went in and played how they wanted to play, but we made some silly mistakes.
“And we can change those things pretty easily. They are all controllable and there are no real big structural issues with our game.
“The World Cup’s 11 months away mate – a lot can happen in 11 months, and a lot can happen in a week.”
Manu Tuilagi trudged out of action in the second-half, but Jones was left to hope the Sale centre had avoided any lasting injury issue.
“He had a blister so that affected his game a little bit,” said Jones. “He’s a bit sore from the blister but we’re not overly concerned at this stage.”
