Matt Williams: England beast is driven by a hunger for rugby’s ultimate prize

On Saturday, Ireland once again do battle with the beast.

This particular beast is highly dangerous, powerful, skilled, motivated, intelligent and can fight in several modes. It wears a white shirt with a red rose on its chest and rides a low-swinging chariot.

So instead of banging on about why Ireland's attack continues to be so abjectly unimaginative that none of their starting wingers have scored a try in any match, we should look at what drives this English beast to reach the final of the Rugby World Cup 2019 and win the Six Nations and the Autumn Nations Cup in 2020 as it looks set to inflict a fifth consecutive defeat on Ireland.

Jones is prepared to use the Six Nations as a rugby laboratory to test his theories and use his players as lab rats in striving for excellence at World Cup 2023

These English achievements are a byproduct of a deeper obsession. They are roadkill on the tortuous path of their obsessive commitment towards striving to lift the William Webb Ellis trophy.

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The deepest of unmentioned truths in Irish rugby is that the country has never totally committed, body and soul, to the mammoth task of winning a World Cup tournament because Ireland have never truly believed, with the total conviction required, that an Irish team can win the World Cup. Nine quarter-final exits are evidence of this unpleasant reality.

To the detriment of the national team, Irish rugby's obsession begins and ends with the Heineken Cup. Irish teams have dominated this competition. In life and rugby, you tend to get what you aim at.

Birthright

England are a totally different beast. They believe it is their birthright to win on the world stage. Ireland do not.

The English coach Eddie Jones has an obsessive relationship with the trophy lovingly known as "Billy Big Ears".

Jones is the most successful coach in the history of the World Cup, having twice made the final as a head coach with the Wallabies in 2003, then England in 2020 and winning as an assistant coach of South Africa in 2007.

Unlike Ireland, he is prepared to use the Six Nations as a rugby laboratory to test his theories and use his players as lab rats in striving for excellence at World Cup 2023.

A positive result of that experimentation sees England as one of the very few national teams that have immunised itself from becoming just another imitator of New Zealand. Jones is a profound thinker on the game. He and his staff have collaborated to create an attacking structure unique to the English team.

Last week Damian Penaud scored a magnificent try for France that was launched from a stunning lineout attack play straight out of a 1980s playbook

It is a system designed to maximise the talent of the English players.

Unlike the copy-and-paste plagiarists of Kiwi thinking, not one rotund English hooker will be found loitering on the sidelines as the last attacking runner, waiting, like a well-fed dachshund, to slowly sausage down the field as the defensive greyhounds swoop in to cover. Why any attacking system wants a slow-running forward as their last attacker requires a lot of justification.

New Zealand have designed a system that suits their player talent; England have done the same and have rightly produced a different but highly efficient design. I cannot overstress the importance of England’s creation of a system that suits their current playing talent. They have not forced their talent into an ill-fitting Kiwi mould.

With their forwards working between the two 15-metre lines, both English wingers and their fullback have a licence to roam on the extremities. Quite often all three are on the one side of the field. The three fastest runners in the team on the wing? Wow! That just might catch on... as long as New Zealand do it first, so every mug can copy it.

Playmakers

The English system is guided by their two playmakers, George Ford and Owen Farrell, who can work side-by-side as a unit, or split to use half the field each. It is a flexible, intelligent and highly effective attacking framework.

The intellectually lazy use the term “modern” to praise a system, or “old school” to denigrate one. The only factor that matters is whether the system is effective or not.

Last week Damian Penaud scored a magnificent try for France that was launched from a stunning lineout attack play straight out of a 1980s playbook. If that is "old school" then I am all for it. The play was highly effective against England's defensive system. That all we need to know.

Two years out from the next World Cup, Jones has used this Six Nations to explore his team’s attacking options. Some of these options, such as playing Farrell at outhalf, have not worked. The experience has seen England occasionally dip into adversity.

Jones understands that placing his team into adversity between World Cups creates resilience. New Zealand’s World Cup history is proof that to encounter adversity only during World Cups leads to failure.

Even in the unlikely event that England come away from the Aviva with empty pockets, they remain in far better shape to get their hands on the Webb Ellis Cup in 2023 than their Irish counterparts who have barely given 2023 a glancing thought.

Two years out, England understand the conundrum put forward by the Red Queen in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass. “It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!”

Or, in rugby terms, “If you stand still, you will go backwards.”

Ireland appears to have both feet firmly planted on Irish soil, while England are striding towards France 2023.