Eddie Jones says he takes full responsibility for England’s sub-par performance in the World Cup final against the Springboks in Japan last November.

Earlier in the week, former World Cup-winning coach Clive Woodward suggested England allowed themselves to become distracted prior to the 2019 final against South Africa.

ALSO READ: Woodward – England got complacent before RWC final

In response to the criticism, Jones openly admitted that he was at fault for England’s deficiencies in the final and not his players as Woodward had implied.

‘Well, he [Woodward] is a World Cup winner, so he’s always got the final say,’ Jones joked. ‘But look, could we have prepared better? Yeah, of course we could’ve. The end result is we didn’t play well in the final, so we didn’t prepare well enough. I’ve accepted responsibility for that.

‘We did everything we thought we needed to do, but sometimes there’s just something there hiding that you don’t find. And if it was that easy, we’d never lose a game of rugby because if we knew all of it all the time, we’d never lose a game. But we don’t know everything all the time, even if we work as hard as we can to find it.

‘Sometimes we’re not perfect and that was the case in the World Cup final. As I’ve said, I accept full responsibility for that. I didn’t have the team where they needed to be.

‘Can I learn from it? Yes, I’m always learning. I’m 60 now and I’m still trying to learn how to coach rugby.’

Watch: Jones responds to Woodward’s criticism of Marler

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