England vs South Africa: Eddie Jones to present non-Rugby World Cup final players with their own shirts

Nine players who have missed out on selection to face South Africa will be handed their own ‘matchday shirts’ on the eve of the match to prove how important their role has been throughout the World Cup campaign

Eddie Jones will today present the England squad members not named in the team for the Rugby World Cup final against South Africa with their own matchday shirts to show how important they have been through the Japan 2019 campaign.

Jones named his final matchday 23 of the World Cup on Thursday, sticking with the same team that convincingly beat New Zealand in the semi-finals bar the addition of Ben Spencer for the injured Willi Heinz.

It means that scrum-half Heinz misses out on selection after being removed from the 31-man squad last weekend, although the Gloucester half-back has remained in Japan for the week of the final. He will be joined on the sideline in Yokohama by the rest of the team who have not been selected in Ellis Genge, Jack Singleton, Joe Launchbury, Lewis Ludlam, Piers Francis, Jack Nowell, Joe Cokanasiga and Ruaridh McConnochie.

But the slogan throughout the eight-week campaign in Japan has been ‘Team of 31’, a phrase that the head coach has stressed the importance of buying into, and to reward the way that his players have taken his message on board, Jones has a surprise for them to ease the pain of missing the final.

“They’ve got an important role supporting the team, and they’ve been exceptional,” Jones said. “They’re the heroes of the team, the way they train, and we had another high-quality training session on Wednesday.

“One of the things we’ve done to show how much we appreciate the work that they’ve done for the team is that on Friday, after the team has its get-together, we present each of those players with their own shirt for the game, numbers 24 to 31, just to show how much they’ve worked. So they get the same shirt as every other player.

“Unfortunately, they don’t get to wear it on the field. But it’s important for us, because they’ve been fantastic.”

Jones has repeatedly praised the way his squad have tackled every challenge that he has put out in front of them in Japan, having seen the leaders within his squad rise to prominence over his four-year project after learning from their setbacks as well as their triumphs.

But it has now reached the point that Jones believes they have learned to manage what he describes as the “world’s biggest family” to the point that he almost isn’t needed anymore – almost.

“We’ll have a chat at the hotel before we leave, but all the work’s done,” Jones added. “I think I said when I first took over the job – my job’s to become redundant. And I’m almost redundant now. The team’s running the team, which is how it should be.

“I think you always work back from our goal. What’s your goal? Where do you want to go? How are you going to get there? I don’t have great visualisation powers, but I know where we want to go and I know how we have to do it. So we just need to go ahead and do it now.

Willi Heinz had to be replaced in the England squad but will still receive a World Cup final jersey (Reuters)

“I always say if coaching was that easy, everyone would do it, and they don’t. Because we’ve got a group of players that is like the biggest family in the world - 31 players and you know if you have a family of five, you have dinner, you have difficulties. Thirty-one players having dinner together, every day is different, every day is about working out how you can make the dynamics better, how you can get them to think the same way, so it’s always there for you.”