England suffer when Billy Vunipola is not around, but Jonathan Joseph in particular thrives on that extra yard of space Billy gives the backline
Eddie Jones’s decision to drop Jonathan Joseph caught a lot of people by surprise. Joseph was one of England’s most dangerous attacking threats in 2016. Clearly he was not at those standards against France and Wales. So why the dip in form?
The automatic assumption is that it is down to the individual. Yet I would argue that Joseph is a victim of Billy Vunipola’s injury. It may seem odd to equate the form of an outside centre with the presence of a No 8, but throughout rugby there are these odd combinations where a player will bring the best out of another in an entirely different position.
Joseph is brilliant when defenders are on his inside shoulder. When defenders are on his outside shoulder, he looks a bit stifled as a lot of players tend to do. When both Billy and Mako are playing for England, the defence ends up being concentrated and narrower to deal with their direct threat. Without them the opposition defence is a lot wider.
That means Joseph is finding that he is getting the ball with lots of defenders in front of him without many options; whereas previously he was getting the ball with defenders on his inside. That is where he is at his best. He can do that little stop-step and go again, put a grubber in make a break on the outside. He isn’t getting those opportunities any more.
What it tells us is that England are not creating as much space in phase play as they previously did with Vunipola in the side. Over the previous two years they created a lot of space in phase play by upping the tempo. The only real space we saw them create against Wales was off a counter attack from a terrible kick. The rest of the game was based on power and momentum. Some of that was very good. There were periods in the first half where I thought England looked very strong carrying and making ground at the gainline, but they still had to go through many more phases than they previously did. When they were scoring tries in the autumn, they were scoring off 2-3-4 phases whereas now they having to carry 7-8-9 times to make the same sort of ground and beating less defenders.
One of those guys who was beating a lot of defenders was Joseph. Clearly England as a whole suffer when Vunipola is not around, but Joseph in particular thrives on that extra yard of space that Billy gives the backline. He doesn’t have the power to barrel through a tackle nor the out and out gas of a Jonny May.
It works the other way around too. The presence of a back who can regularly win turnovers such as Brian O’Driscoll or Alex Dunbar has a huge knock-on effect for the flankers in the side. Without that extra man, it means you are going to have to chase a few lost causes and end up getting trapped in rucks you don’t want to be in. Likewise, Billy Vunipola also benefits from having Mike Brown alongside him. Having that rock at full back means he will field the high ball, distribute allowing the No 8 to make ground.
I think it is something players should pay more attention to when they come to changing clubs. A lot was made of George Ford moving to Leicester to play alongside Ben Youngs. But if I was in his shoes then the scrum half is only a small part of it. The reassurances I would be seeking from Leicester is that you are going to get me a really big ball carrier and I am going to be playing on the front foot which is when Ford is at his best.
I moved to Leicester in 1996 not because Joel Stransky was going to be arriving or Dean Richards was going to be my No 8, even if that was part of it. I went there because the pack was massive and I knew I was going to be going forward the majority of the time. I had an offer to go to Bath who played the prettier rugby but their pack was nowhere near the standards of Leicester’s. When you do think about your next move it does go hand in hand with the player next to you but moreover the style of play that you are going to be fitting into.
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Ford could become expendable as well. Again it comes down to partnerships. Ford and Joseph almost go hand in hand in that balance of how the team is going to play, but are not half as effective if they are getting slow, static ball. It looks like Jones will go with a midfield of Owen Farrell, Ben Te’o and Elliot Daly, which has a really good blend about it.
I would expect England to win by at least 50 points with the way Italy played in the first two matches. You are at home against a side who can only really play rugby for 30 minutes. You have to make that half an hour the most excruciating and tiring of their entire careers and then the game will open up to really run up a score.
That he is just missing the Italy game will be no consolation to Joseph. You can be playing Papua New Guinea but you don’t want to be sent home. You want more caps and someone could have an unbelievable game against weaker opposition and you end up not coming back. That’s the worrying thing because Jones may say I really like that balance in the midfield and that would suit Scotland because they are tight around 10-12. All of a sudden you find yourself going from being a star to being on the outside looking in.
