Eddie Jones makes public apology...before attacking journalist's 'professionalism'

Eddie Jones moved from defence to attack better than his players today as he dealt with the fall-out from the television pictures of his expletive filled rant as England struggled to defeat Argentina and an unwelcome intrusion into the team’s inner-sanctum at their five star hotel base in Bagshot.

Jones apologised for his reaction to yet another mistake by his players as they laboured to a 21-8 win over the Pumas and revealed his mother had been far from impressed with his language. “I want to apologise for swearing in public and it is not acceptable. I will find a different way to express my frustration in the future.

“I am in trouble with my mother and that’s a big enough punishment for me. She still tells me not to swear. I am in the dog house and certainly won’t do it again. I think everyone was a bit frustrated on Saturday and I was one of them and I should have shown more self-control.”

However, Jones quickly turned his attention to a member of the English press who had taken down notes from a whiteboard at the entrance to the players’ area last week that is off limits to everyone else in the Pennyhill Park Hotel. The journalist, who it is understood writes a diary column for a mid-market tabloid, is no longer welcome at media briefings and Jones could not hide his anger at what he views as a very serious error of judgement.

He said:”I am very disappointed in the way the media has behaved. We have had a member of your contingent break into our area at the hotel, take photographs of classified information so we are extremely disappointed. I expect more professionalism from the journalist. In the future I would appreciate if you would respect our private areas of the hotel. Yeh, so it’s quite disappointing. I have made my point and that is the end of it.”

These two incidents dominated the build up to the clash with Australia at Twickenham on Saturday with England having won the last four meetings between the teams.