Wales boss Gatland tells England coach Jones to mind his own business and says Dragons are firing not tiring as they close on Grand Slam
WARREN GATLAND has told Eddie Jones to mind his own business - and let Wales crack on with delivering another Grand Slam.
The Wales coach was bristling after Jones described the Dragons as a “tired” team on the official RFU Twitter account, ahead of their bid to complete a clean sweep against Ireland on Saturday.
A Welsh defeat and victory for England over Scotland would hand Jones’ team the Six Nations title.
But Gatland has clearly had enough of the Aussie’s mind games.
He stormed: “What the hell is Eddie Jones doing talking about our game? It was me I’d be concentrating on playing Scotland. I’ve got no other comment on Eddie Jones talking about us.”
Gatland did not stay quiet on Jones for long, as he rubbished his rival’s claim that Wales had been forced to make more tackles than anyone else.
The Wales coach, whose side have made 660 tackles in the Six Nations compared to England’s 793, added: “If you look at the stats England have made a hell of a lot more tackles than us in this tournament.
"My advice to Eddie is to concentrate on the Scotland match.”
Praying that Ireland do what they did to England in 2017 and wreck another Slam, Jones - hours earlier - ramped-up the pressure on Gatland’s unbeaten Dragons as he looked for his third title in just four years at Twickenham.
Chucking his verbal grenade the Aussie said: “They are starting to look a bit tired. I’m just saying what I see, mate. I see a team that’s looking tired, I see an Ireland team that’s peaking.
“Wales have made more tackles than anyone else in the tournament and they are playing against an Ireland side that seems to be peaking at the right time.
“You look at guys like Conor Murray, Johnny Sexton, Garry Ringrose, Peter O’Mahoney, guys that weren’t in great form at the start of the tournament are now starting to come to the fore.
“Sexton and Murray have been off the pace a little bit. But they look like they’ve got their mojo back. They’re working well together. It was quite evident in the last game that their relationship was stronger than it has been for a while.
“James Ryan was the star and everyone targeted him - he’s finding his feet again. They’re in a good spot. And they’ve got a lot to prove in the last game. It’s a fascinating close to the tournament. Three teams can win it.”
Jones also tried to wind Gatland up before England travelled to Cardiff last month, saying this must be the “greatest Welsh team ever” because they are on a record-breaking run of 13 consecutive victories.
He also described their February 23 shootout as the biggest game of their lives for the Wale players – only for Gatland to reply that it was not a particularly big occasion, “because we’re only playing England!”!
Wales had the last word with a 21-13 victory to seize control of the Six Nations, overturning a 10-3 half time deficit.
Yet Jones didn’t just fire a warning shot at Wales, either. He also took aim at Scotland ahead of their Calcutta Cup clash at Twickenham as the visitors look to win at HQ for the first time in 36 years.
most read in rugby union
Jones added: “We’re going in a great direction and Saturday will be a bit of an explosion.
“We’re nowhere near our best, we’re just slowly getting there. We’ll be at our best for the Six Nations on Saturday. We had a training run on Wednesday, which in terms of all the GPS was by far our most impressive.
“There’s a great deal of urgency about what we want to do, what we want to play, the point we want to prove. We want to be the best team in the world and we know we’re not the best team in the world.
“We’ve got an opportunity on Saturday to show that we’re the best team in the Six Nations and approaching the best team in the world and we’re not going to miss that opportunity.”