The championship grave robbers, who stole a second successive game in the dead of night in Cardiff on Saturday, did so with the England coach’s three-second rule ringing in their ears.
Jones gives his players that long to be back on their feet and in the action after a tackle or a ruck involvement and believes their ability to meet the target is an important barometer for him of the upgrade he has overseen since taking over a team down on its knees 15 months ago.
“I think some of the blokes used to have a cup of tea and a scone with jam and cream before they got off the ground. It was terrible,” said the England coach.
“The improvement has been enormous but I went through it with the staff today and we were talking about the gap between us and New Zealand. In terms of getting off the ground we are seven seven per cent below New Zealand. We are still not where we need to be.
“Everything we do is geared towards bridging that gap between us and New Zealand. We are not happy being the best team in Europe, we want to be the best team in the world.”
Making Six Nations history by becoming the first side to complete back-to-back Grand Slams would be a useful springboard.
England are well on the way. The team who somehow found a way to lose their pivotal World Cup game against Wales 18 months ago somehow found a way to win it at the Principality Stadium late on, just like against France last Saturday.
And the sprint finishes are, insisted Jones, no fluke.
“How many games out of our last 15 wins have we won in last 20 minutes?” he said. “That’s not by coincidence. It’s because we train to win those last 20 minutes.
“We back ourselves. Wales were the benchmark team in Europe for winning games in the last 20 minutes. Now we’ve beaten them three times in a row, so maybe we deserve that title.
“We use a methodology which I’ve borrowed from soccer called tactical periodisation. Every day we train a specific parameter of the game.
“We have one day where we have a physical session and do more contacts than we would do in a game. Then we have a fast day where we try to train for at least 60 per cent of the session above game speed.
“We don’t do any extra fitness, it’s all done within those training sessions. Because of that we’ve improved our fitness enormously. I did it with for Japan from the second year I was there and then I’ve done it with England.”
Jones picked up the theory from a Spanish exercise physiologist Alberto Mendez-Villanueva who has also worked with Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho.
It essentially involves incorporating the key pillars of a game, into every training session at blinding intensity.
“We train fast and it’s not just helter skelter or unstructured. It’s all planned and researched so we create these training session that are harder than a game. It gives us confidence knowing we have trained to a greater intensity,” said captain Dylan Hartley.
If Wales played a part in their own demise at the end of a pulsating game, it was Owen Farrell who drove the dagger home by putting Elliot Daly in for the killer try.
Farrell, captain for the last 33 minutes after Hartley was withdrawn earlier than at any previous time under Jones, is fast assuming the mantle of England’s leader-in-waiting.
For the coach, it was a sweet moment at the ground where he sacked as Wallaby coach after England’s team bus was greeted by a single-finger salute from Wales supporters.
“When you come here with the Wallabies they’re normally waving. I thought I’d give them a sign back but then thought I’d better not,” said Jones.
Outplayed at the breakdown where Jones admitted his wildcard selection Jack Clifford had a “difficult” time, England also badly missed the thrust of the Vunipola brothers against a ferocious Welsh defence but still, by hook or by crook, they came through.
“It is hard for us to blow away teams at the moment because we are lacking a bit of firepower,” said Jones. “We are not smashing over the gain line and getting that quick ball. We are having to work hard to get yardage, work hard to push the defence back but everyone is doing their little bit.”
The elder bruise brother, Mako, should be back for the formality of Italy at Twickenham in a fortnight and England have not given up hope of ‘little’ Billy playing a part in what should now be a Grand Slam shot on the final weekend of the championship.
“He might get back for Ireland. He’d be pretty useful off the bench at 150kg,” said Jones.
