England coach Eddie Jones wants his side to be remembered as the greatest the game has ever seen ahead of the 2020 Six Nations.
Jones said this after naming his 34-man squad for the upcoming Six Nations tournament. The squad feature eight uncapped players and two apprentices, with 10 players from the 2019 World Cup left out.
England are looking to shake things up after the disappointment of the World Cup final loss to the Springboks and Jones said that the Six Nations is an opportunity start making their mark as a great team.
‘We’ve got another opportunity to become the best team in the world,’ Jones said.
‘We also want to be the greatest team that the game of rugby has ever seen, we want to set ourselves high, we want to really see how we can extend ourselves. That’s why we’ve brought in a number of young players as we want to see how far this team can go.
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‘For me, I remember the great All Black teams, I remember the great Australian team of the 90s and that’s what we want to be remembered as – a great team that has sustainable success.
‘We’ve touched it when we played a great game against the All Blacks but we’ve only done that once. When you’ve been in that area you want to do it sustainably.
‘We want to challenge ourselves to see how good we can be. I’m talking about playing sustainable rugby that people remember – how exciting is that?’
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England begin their preparations for the new season this week with a warm-weather camp in Portugal before they open their campaign against France on 2 February.
The start of the Six Nations will mark four years since Eddie Jones took charge of England, which has resulted in two titles as well as the Grand Slam back in 2016.
With four years of experience in the squad, Jones believes they are in a completely different place.
‘In 2016 we took over a team that was not in a good state and there was desperation to do well.
‘This team has got an enhanced reputation, they’ve played some great rugby over the last four years, players have got enhanced reputations and some of them are big stars, so it is a completely different situation and that’s why we want to challenge ourselves.’
Photo: Mike Hewitt/Getty Images
