Eddie Jones puts his faith in England's 'collective talents' for Six Nations title defence

Eddie Jones believes his England side does not rely on any superstar individuals for their success after recording their 23rd victory in 24 matches on Sunday with the 46-15 Six Nations win over Italy, with the head coach instead praising their “collective talents”.

England ran in seven tries to go top of the Six Nations table, with both Anthony Watson and Sam Simmonds scoring two tries apiece to add to scores from Owen Farrell, George Ford and Jack Nowell. Both of Watson’s tries came from Ford looping around Farrell to release their outside back, but rather than select any individuals for praise, Jones was keen to acknowledge the back line as a whole.

“We don’t have a lot of big carriers so we have to be inventive and that was pleasing,” he said. “We invented stuff that gave us momentum.

“George and Owen together see the game better than anyone. Those two guys together give us plenty of options. They are getting a great understanding together and using their collective talents. That’s a key word for us. Our game is based on collective talent. We don’t have a lot of guys that can run through brick walls so we have to rely on collective talent.”

The absence of Billy Vunipola, Nathan Hughes and Manu Tuilagi through injury has robbed Jones of his best ball carriers, which led to the selection of Ben Te’o at outside centre for the encounter in Rome. But rather rely on Te’o’s ability to run the ball up, his presence opened space out wide for Watson and Jonny May to exploit, with devastating consequences for the home team.

It gives England plenty of momentum heading into this Saturday’s visit of Wales to Twickenham, but Jones would not allow himself to look too far ahead in the immediate aftermath of the Rome victory. “I’m not concerned about Wales at this stage,” he added. “What I am excited about is getting back to Twickenham and playing in front of 82,000 people.”

The message clearly resonated through the squad, too, with Farrell – one of the star performers on Sunday – echoing his head coach. “We all watched the [Wales] game, we all sat there and watched both games, but when you’re concentrating on what’s in front of you which is Italy, you don’t really delve too deep into it,” Farrell said. “I guess we’ll try pick it apart tomorrow [Monday] when we get on to Wales but we’ll make sure we’ll enjoy the win.”

Despite losing Ben Youngs to a serious knee ligament injury – which has prompted the calling up of Saracens scrum-half Richard Wigglesworth – the Australian was in jovial spirits in the wake of the victory that saw England go ahead of Wales in the table on points difference.

“I was really pleased with our win today,” he added. “For me, to see a scrum dominate like that, that’s the way we want to play rugby. We can do a lot off the back of that.

“[It’s] Great coaching by Neal Hatley, great physical development by the players. They’ve got stronger, they’ve got more flexible so they can scrum lower. A combination of the players and coaches working together. We’ve prioritised it by having the scrum session against Wales in November and the possibility of having another one sooner rather than later.”

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Another secret weapon in Jones’ armoury is the ability to bring in scrum guru Marc Dal Maso who helped transform the Japanese pack while Jones was working with the Cherry Blossoms, with the former French hooker offering his experience and theories to scrum coach Hatley – although Jones did joke that not all are taken on board immediately.

“He floated in. He’s a crazy scientist,” Jones said, confirming that Dal Maso travelled to Pennyhill Park last week to help England prepare for the Six Nations. “He’s just got the picture of the perfect scrum in his head. I’ve never seen a bloke like him. “He brings something different because he’s got so many unusual thoughts. He might bring six things forward; one of them will be absolutely brilliant. It’s a great resource for us to have him. He floats in, floats out, brings one or two new ideas. Hats [Hatley] works out whether it’s good with the players and if it’s good then we do it and it adds to the scrum.

“He doesn’t speak much English. He didn’t speak much Japanese. I don’t know whether he speaks much French. He brought a young bloke, Alex, to translate.”

Having not allowed his squad to think about Wales, Jones has also made it clear that he won’t be letting his players rest on their laurels despite the comfortable victory in Rome. As Farrell reveals, the team already know that much.

“We’ll hope for improvement anyway no matter who we play,” Farrell added. “This team wants to get better week-on-week and every time you go out there there’s stuff to work on so I’m sure we’ll get stuck into it.”