Rugby’s Eddie Jones and football’s Tony Popovic sit down for breakfast in Tokyo. No, it’s not the setup for a joke, maybe something involving Akubras. Instead, it’s a real scene from just last week, amid Popovic’s sweeping, cross-code search for knowledge that will prepare him to lead Socceroos into this year’s World Cup.
Because say what you will about Jones – and many have since he quit the Wallabies post in favour of Japan – but he’s quite good at this whole World Cup thing. He’s led two different nations to the final, advised another during its win, and guided Japan to a stunning upset win over the Springboks in 2015. Thus, if you’re someone like Popovic, who possesses a glittering club coaching career but has never coached at a major international tournament before, let alone at a swelled, 48-team global showpiece event stretched across three countries – two of which can’t exactly be described as bastions of stability – every piece of knowledge you can extract from someone like Jones is golden.
