I think that is giving Jones too much credit, I think it's much simpler, he has his core of favourites and is too stubborn to change them. He has put an over-emphasis on fitness and not enough on technical skill. We gain nothing from pushing the same group of older players to the limit and losing games from it, we would have gained more by resting them properly and rotating in younger prospects to see how they dealt with the pressure. The last year has been wasted because all the talent highlighted in Argentina has not been utilised since. That tour was little more than a side show filling out the numbers so he could again thrash his core players who hadn't gone with the Lions.
He has been playing by basic statistics which say you need an experienced squad to win whilst ignoring that the players with experience also need to be good. Cole is ****, no 2 ways about it. His main point was a strong scrum and he is not better than any alternatives there. Outside the scrum he is worse than useless, he is a liability and yet Jones persists with him. Why? He's not young, there isn't some hidden talent yet to be uncovered, he simply isn't good enough. He has the most caps though so he stays. The same again to a lesser degree with Hartley and his competition. Lock is ok and yet we are using an abundance of locks in the squad when we don't need to. Back row is the issue and yet is completely ignored. Pushing the team as hard as possible also doesn't explain not having a 3rd choice SH, I mean does any other top team do that?
No the current problem stems from Jones having his favourites, those favourites not being the best in their position and thrashing said favourites by making them work more for club and country than any other players in the world. It is unravelling and he MUST start rotating the squad or we are going to be in a really, really bad position next world cup.
