Jones fed up with Straeuli's baiting
July 25, 2002

Australian coach Eddie Jones finally said enough was enough on Thursday when he slammed Springbok coach Rudolf Straeuli for his continued attempts to bait their hosts.

Straeuli has not been backward in his attempts to spark a war of words throughout the build-up to this Saturday's Tri Nations clash in Brisbane.

Whether it concerned the way the Ben Tune doping scandal was handled, the lack of agression from the Wallabies compared to the All Blacks, querying the recruitment of rugby league stars or their general selection policy Straeuli has had something to say.

But Jones today chose to bite back. "Straeuli has been making statements on a number of issues and you wonder where it is going to stop."

"He seems to take delight in making statements about every Australian rugby issue. It goes from querying our recruitment policy, accusing our forwards of not having enough courage and even suggesting we are arrogant.

"He might be trying to deflect the attention away from his team and onto the Australian team."

"It is disappointing that he is taking a cheap shot in these circumstances and now he wants a new set of rules for the IRB drug policy," Jones said of the call to be dope tested.

"But the Tune incident is something we have to deal with and we just have to get on with it. It just means more media work.

"Ben is okay. No-one likes to be in his position, but I hope we have the right support systems in place and he'll just have to get on with it and play. He has been very professional and focused and I think he has dealt with the issue in a faultless manner."

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