England rugby coach Eddie Jones has revealed he used a samurai sword and kiwifruit to inspire his side ahead of their 2019 Rugby World Cup semifinal win over the All Blacks.
England denied the All Blacks a shot at a third straight World Cup title when they outperformed New Zealand to win 19-7 in Yokohama. Jones' team went on to lose the final to the Springboks, his second World Cup final defeat as a coach.
The Telegraph have shared a chapter from Jones' latest book - Extracts from Leadership: Lessons from my life in rugby by Eddie Jones which explains the lengths he went to to inspire his side before that win over Steve Hansen's team.
Before the clash, the All Blacks had won six straight games against England. Jones says it wasn't a rousing speech but a simple act involving an expensive samurai sword and a piece of fruit.
"People might expect that, before we beat the All Blacks, I would have made a defining, tub-thumping speech of leadership to inspire an exceptional performance. I was, instead, pretty low-key and measured that evening.
"But, three days earlier, on the Wednesday, I felt we weren't quite there in training. We weren't sharp enough for the All Blacks. So I did something different that evening. I brought a samurai sword into the team room. It was impressive and authentic and I had spent a fair amount of money on it from an antique shop in Tokyo. I also brought in some kiwi fruit. You could say it was cheesy, rather than fruity, but I used the samurai sword to scythe them in two. The blade was so sharp that the kiwi fruits split apart in an instant.
"'There you go, boys,' I said. 'See how we do it now?'
"The players were laughing but a few of them shot me a look as if to say, 'S---, this guy is nuts.' I still walked around the room with the samurai sword and made them all feel the deadly blade."
Jones reveals in the book they then come up with the idea do something different when facing the haka.
"From there we developed the idea of facing down the haka in a V formation with Owen Farrell at the head of it. We also had a very rigorous meeting with the players' leadership group the next morning and I pointed out some of the minor problems. The players addressed them and got it right. We won the game.
"If we had lost, people would have been entitled to say: 'How stupid was all that stuff with the samurai sword?' But it makes a good story and we can say we brought out the sword and a small tray of kiwi fruit before one of England's most famous victories."
