The Most Miserable Coaching Tenure in Rugby History

The Most Miserable Coaching Tenure in Rugby History
Dive into the tumultuous journey of Eddie Jones during his time with the Wallabies in the lead up to and during the 2023 Rugby World Cup. We’ll explore the highs, the lows, and everything in between, providing an overview of one of the most controversial periods in recent Rugby history.

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Corrections:
The last Australian team won super rugby in 2014 not 2011

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At the start of 2023 by many accounts the appointment of Eddie Jones as the new W’s head coach was a great decision fans and pundits were excited all around but that enthusiasm was shortlived and what started as a struggle to even win a game turned into a historical disaster

Let’s take a look back at the landscape of Australian rugby which led to Jones’s appointment and one of the worst coaching tenures in rugby history at the end of 2022 the Wes were doing just fine on paper it may not have looked that way with a third place finish in the rugby

Championship and only winning five of 14 games games that year if we look a bit deeper it starts to look a little bit more respectable they lost to three of the best teams in the world Ireland France and New Zealand by less than a score with the game against New Zealand

Having a very controversial refereeing decision where if the referee hadn’t pinged them for time wasting they probably would have won and they also beat South Africa in one of their games that year however with a loss to Italy in that November and mounting a comeback against the Wales team that hadn’t been

Performing consistently well for a few years now wasn’t good enough for rugby Australia you see they’re hosting the 2027 Rugby World Cup and to try and get the nation behind that tourn tournament they felt they needed a top performance in France in 2023 to bring the Australian public onside so head coach

Dave reny was sacked with less than a year to go to the Rugby World Cup but rugby Australia didn’t do this without a plan this was a reaction to one of the best head coaches to ever coach the game Eddie Jones being Let Go by England and

They snapped him up as quickly as they could Eddie Jones had an over 80% win record at World Cups and is the only head coach to ever get to two Rugby World Cup finals which is still true on a technicality I mean who would be a

Better option to take the wall to France and continue on until the next World Cup was he the man who was going to save Australian rugby you see Rugby Union in Australia has been struggling with the popularity of the NRL and the AFL Rugby Union has been left to the Wayside in

Super Rugby in 2023 the average attendance in Australia was just 11,43 a drop of 6,267 from 10 years ago where it stood at 17,6 70 and a drop of over 14,500 in 2005 which had an average of attendance of 2,99 to add further insult to injury the average attendance in 2005 is actually

Higher than the highest attendance in 2023 at 2,076 but it’s not only the fans abandoning the sport it’s the athletes too with one of the biggest names in Aussie rugby Mark noat Nasi having signed for NRL side the Sydney Roosters from 2025 and many players who ply their

Youth rugby in Union such as Cameron Murray and cin ponga actually turn to League when they become professional due to the increased opportunity at the 16 NRL sides as opposed to the five Super Rugby sides to add to this is the falling and respectively low investment in the Grassroots game with $4.3 million

Australian dollars spent in 2019 which is around 3.5% of expenditure compared to the afl’s $58 million and the nrl’s $43 million it did rise to about 7% of expenditure in 2021 which I think is around 9 million Australian dollars so it’s a marked improvement but it’s still complet completely dwarfed by the other

Sports and in real terms is less than what they were spending 20 years ago and to cap it off they haven’t won the rugby Championship since 2015 the blood is lo up since 2002 and no franchise has won Super Rugby since 2011 it’s becoming abundantly clear why Rugby Union in

Australia is dying and the 2027 World Cup is an attempt to bring them back so they brought back the head coach who took them to the World Cup final the last time they hosted the tournament and the last to win the blers low cup to get them back on track but perhaps they

Should have looked at Eddie more recent numbers than opposed to what happened 20 years ago Jones became the England head coach after they embarrassingly bowed out of their home World Cup in 2015 at the group stage and turned them around immediately winning a six nations Grand Slam only months later in 2016 and

Retaining their title in 2017 they also went on a record equaling 18g game winning streak and kept it all off with a 2019 World Cup final appearance but things started to wobble after that they did still go on to win the 2026 Nations and also won the Autumn Nations cup that

November but that would be the end of Eddie’s success in England they finished fifth in the 2021 Six Nations and also became the first England team to lose to Scotland at Twickenham in 38 years they had a marginal Improvement in 2022 finishing third but after England were

Boed off the pitch that November against South Africa Eddie Jones was finished as England head coach and that’s when rugby Australia stepped in the 2023 rugby Championship would come around with massive Intrigue to see what Eddie would do with his new side after all he did turn England from World Cup group stage

Exitor to Grand Slam champions in a matter of months and turned Japans from World Cup minnows into a team capable of beating the spring box could he do the same with the wallabies his first game was away against the box and Jones would pick a young exciting team to take on a

South Africa side that hadn’t quite got ticking yet in this world cup cycle but all their gears would be in motion in Johannesburg that evening with an embarrassing 43 to2 loss in in Johannesburg the second Jones era at Australia would not start with a banging

But no big deal it’s a new team and a new coach against one of the best sides in the world now they have a home game against Argentina and things would get back on track right well Argentina had a few things to say about that in a close

Fought battle with three tries after the 70th minute Argentina would score late to beat the wbees in Australia 34 to 31 and things didn’t get much better when bitter Rivals the All Blacks crossed the Tasman C and beat them 38 to7 for Australia to be whitewashed in the rugby

Championship for the first time since 2005 which funny enough was a team also managed by Eddie Jones but looking forward to the World Cup they would find themselves in a pool involving three tier 2 nations in Fiji Portugal and Georgia along with the whale site who

Also had a returning head coach and had been what can only really be described as utter dross in that Year’s Six Nations all things were looking Dandy for Australia to get to a World Cup quarterfinal and even some idiots on the internet making pre preview videos were

Saying they’d finish top of their group but then disaster would strike Fiji would win the Pacific Nations cup beating Japan 35 to 12 along the way and then on the 26th of August they would turn up to Twickenham and beat England for the first time in their history 30

To 22 all of a sudden the pressure was on in p c for Australia Eddie Jones had also named a rather controversial Squad going for youth overe experience in some areas dropping longtime servants to the wallabies like Quaid Cooper and opting for younger players like Carter Gordon along with naming uncapped 18-year-old

Fullback Max Jorgenson with the losses to New Zealand and France in the leadup to the World Cup they would kick it off against Georgia with some even quietly Whispering about a Georgian win but Australia would hold strong and comfortably get their first win under Eddie Jones and beat Georgia 35 to 15

But the big match against Fiji would come next now some context on Fiji Fiji is a small Pacific island nation that started playing rugby when it was brought over by the British in the 19th century and was originally played between British and Native Fijian service members but was shortly after

Racially segregated but nonetheless a love for the sport was sprouted where they Pride themselves and playing some of the most free flowing and attractive rugby but Fiji has always suffered from a lack of professionalism and money on the islands they’ve had some of the best players in the world playing around the

Globe but have historically struggled to bring it together on the national stage that was until two things happened the addition of Vern cra’s head coach and later Simon Ry woi and the admission of the Fiji to Super Rugby cter left at the end of 2022 and replaced by Simon Ry wui but

Cter brought what he brings everywhere he goes a strong emphasis on set peace and defense which Ray wui who was involved in the dra already was able to build off of in the leadup to this world cup like turning their Mall into something that was fine under Cotter into an absolutely destructive weapon

And the drw allowed them to have a core set of players who played in Fiji and were familiar with each other which made it easier for them to bond together but Fiji somewhat controversial Al lost their opening game to Wales after dropping the ball over the line three

Times and some suggesting they had a penalty try not given any of those would have been enough for them to win the game Fiji were hungry angry and had Australia in their sides having not beaten Australia in over 60 years and with the two- sides results going into

The game some Australians were confident that they should have enough to get over the line but Fiji had other ideas and in the most UN Fiji like way ever they would win the game 22 to5 mainly by offending fantastic kicking display from scrum half Simone kuroi having not

Beaten a tier one nation under Eddie Jones and losing to unclassified as tier two even though they probably shouldn’t be things couldn’t get any worse against Wales right well due to Wales beating Fiji in the opening game an Australia win could see them back door their way

Into a quarterfinal and with wales’ form going into the World Cup it wasn’t entirely out of the question Wales finished fourth in the Six Nations which involved a record defeat to the Scots at murfield and with their narrow victory in round one and a somewhat unconvincing performance against Portugal some

Australians were allowing themselves to Hope and as a Scotland fan I have the relevant experience to let you know that having hope is about as good an idea as betting an Ireland to win a World Cup quarterfinal and only 3 minutes into the game Wills would take a lead with a try

But it would be off the boot of Gareth ancom where most of the damage would come and Australia found themselves 16 to six down at halftime but in the opening 12 minutes of the second half Wales would score 13 unanswered points to boot them out of sight of the wab in

Fact Wales wouldn’t concede any more points in the whole match and when the final whistle blew Wales had boot 40 points on the WABE who hadn’t extended their score beyond the six they had in the 14th minute Australia’s World Cup was all but over their only chance left

Was for Portugal to beat Fiji that was never going to happen was it well I’m sure as we all know now Portugal did beat Fiji to get their first ever World Cup win through a late Try by Rodrigo Marta which was success converted by Samuel Marquez but unfortunately for

Australia and fortunately for Fiji they’re losing ponus point they acquired in their 23 to 24 lost to Oso boss was enough to see Fiji through and saw Australia crash out of the Rugby World Cup for the first time at the pool stages in the aftermath of the world cup

With seven losses and only two wins to Eddie’s name he resigned from his post at Aussie rugby on the 1st of November to join Japan 6 weeks later leaving rugby Australia clueless on who can take the Reigns for the next four years leading up up to their home world cup

With a British and Irish Lions turn a couple of years and a women’s and men’s World Cup not long after can the new rugby Australia CEO Phil wo find a way to get the wab bees back to the team that won two World Cups in the ’90s

Which you can learn all about by watching this video right here about the entire history of the Rugby World Cup thanks for watching