Guiness Premiership: Growing South African influence forces Jones out of Vicarage Road

Rugby Union / Ralph Ellis / 05 February 2009 / Leave a Comment

Australian coach quits Saracens in protest as club moves to court ex-pat community in London.

Football fans have long had misgivings over the growing foreign influences at our leading clubs.

Arsene Wenger has brought a huge French contingent to Arsenal, Rafa Benitez a Spanish influence to Liverpool, and in his time Jose Mourinho spent some big money on a few fairly ordinary Portuguese players at Chelsea. On top of that has come the influx of foreign owners with their own worldwide agendas.

With less publicity the same process has been going on in rugby, and is just as worrying. Now this morning comes news that highly regarded coach Eddie Jones is quitting Saracens in protest at the growing South African influence at the club.

I can remember in my early days as an agency reporter covering Saracens matches at a playing field in Southgate, with one tiny stand from which you needed to pop out every 20 minutes to the phone box to dictate a report. And thank heavens the club has moved on so far since then. They've worked hard at their marketing since moving to share Vicarage Road and have grown the club to be an integral part of the Guinness Premiership.

But the club's co-owners, who also have stakes in two Super-14 franchises in South Africa, have been looking more and more at ways to tap into the huge community of ex-pats from the Republic who live in London. There has even been talk of a name change to London South Africa and a move to relocate at Craven Cottage to be closer to that community.

The Daily Express's Neill Squires scores an exclusive this morning that Australian Jones, who brought England captain Steve Borthwick to the club in the summer, will not be back at the club after a row with his bosses about their future policy. It's well known that he was becoming increasingly disillusioned, and all the more so since chief executive Mark Sinderberry left two months ago. The club's new chief exec, Ed Griffiths, comes from . . . surprise, surprise, South Africa.

Jones has top pedigree in the game. He took Australia to the 2003 World Cup final and was also part of the Springbok management team in 2007, but according to Squires he's going to be let go with two years of his contract still to run.

The disruption comes at a bad time for the club, seventh in the Premiership, and second favourites at [4.0] to win the European Challenge Cup after Jones guided them into the quarter-finals. Word from Australia is that he's likely to stay in England and take a new role in Rugby League with Wigan - who are [9.4] to win Super League.

Five things you might not know about Eddie Jones...

1. Born in Burnie, Tasmania in 1960 his mother is Japanese.

2. He made his name as a coach guiding ACT Brumbies to their first ever Super 12 title.

3. His time as coach of Australia ended in the sack after he lost eight of nine games.

4. He's keen on Rugby League and was a prime mover in converting Wendell Sailor, Mat Rogers and Lote Tuqiri to play for the Wallabies.

5. He often takes absence from his work in England to fly to Japan where he has a consultancy role with the Suntory club.