England leave Jones sucking lemons but demolition of Japan shows widening gulf

Brave Blossoms looked like Sunday afternoon amateurs but the one-sided result highlights the failings of the international landscape

What can we surmise from that? England are very good at shooting fish in a barrel. Max Ojomoh looks the part when given the freedom of Twickenham in which to operate. Will Joseph can finish, Maro Itoje can remove candy from the clutches of a baby and someone on the TV production crew has a sadistic streak.

After almost every England try – and there were 13 of them here – the camera would pan to Eddie Jones in the coaches’ box. His face that little more forlorn every time. One more lemon sucked. Japan had a man sent off before they had touched the ball and things got no better for the Brave Blossoms.

England under Steve Borthwick are accomplished at this kind of thing. At coming up against inferior sides and making them look like Sunday afternoon amateurs. They did similar to an off-colour Australia last week, and the same can be said for the manner in which they dispatched Fiji over the summer. Borthwick ensures they stay in their structures, they stick to the script and keep the foot on the throat. Flat-track bullies, perhaps, but uber-professional, Borthball to its core. He only has words of praise for Jones but maybe this was revenge, too, for all those 5am emails he was expected to reply to.

It was a day that went about as well as the Rugby Football Union could have wished. That it achieved what was near enough a sell-out for a foregone conclusion is impressive enough but to sell 9,864 under-16s tickets – thought to be a record for juniors at a men’s Test at Twickenham – is a considerable feather in the cap. In more candid moments, executives admit that the usual age profile at Twickenham is a problem that needs addressing but it helps to have the draw that someone like Henry Pollock brings. Indeed, it is no wonder that the RFU chief executive, Bill Sweeney, has recently outlined plans to unearth the next generation of Pollocks. Details were a bit thin on the ground but the sentiment was clear. The only shame being that against Japan he was far quieter than last week on the field.

Thanks to Joseph, however, a generation raised on highlights reels had plenty of reasons to celebrate. You sense they went home happy enough despite the fact that this match was in effect over before it was a minute old. But there is something dissatisfying about watching such a one-sided contest, not least given events in Paris and Cardiff this weekend. That is not the players’ fault, nor Borthwick’s, but it only serves to highlight the inconvenient truth about the international rugby landscape. There are simply not teams of the required quality and not enough is being done to raise the bar.

Domestic Japanese rugby is beset by its own problems and plenty of them contribute to why the Brave Blossoms have regressed since beating South Africa at the 2015 World Cup before lighting up their own four years later and reaching the quarter-finals. But the established nations are not doing enough to help. In fact, they want the shop closed.

At the same time Sweeney was pitching his Pollock production line, he was outlining how 10 of the 12 nations competing in this competition – the Six Nations and the Sanzaar unions – are clubbing together and pooling their commercial rights. Japan and Fiji, who are invited guests to this competition, are left on the outside looking in and make no mistake, the USA will be whistled up to replace one of them if they can ever get their house in order.

Promotion and relegation is supposed to be enshrined in the fabric of the competition but given the 10 unions’ newfound collaboration, it is hard to see it happening in practice. The upshot is that the established unions will get financially stronger and emerging nations find further barriers to development. Just look at the parlous state in which Samoa find themselves amid a drain of talent to rugby league.

The RFU would argue, however, that it loses money in World Cup years and that the Nations Championship was, in effect, designed to counteract that shortfall. The pandemic crystallised matters for the Six Nations and Sanzaar. Strengthening emerging nations was no longer the priority, safeguarding their own futures was. Hence the advent of this competition.

But what is the end game? The pool stages of next year’s World Cup will be plagued by washouts because there are barely any sides who can give the aforementioned 10 nations a game. There will be some blockbuster matches from the quarter-finals onwards but you can put the mortgage on them all featuring those 10 nations. The reality is that, 11 years since Japan stunned the Springboks, the established order is no closer to being challenged and F10 – as they have labelled their new venture – only reinforces their position. Jones knew the size of the gap when he masterminded that victory in 2015 and, with every closeup in the coaches box, it was clear he knows it is only going to get wider.