Eddie Jones appoints World Cup winner Matt Proudfoot to England backroom reshuffle

Steve Borthwick switches to skills coach amid doubts over future.

Eddie Jones has appointed World Cup-winning South Africa forwards coach Matt Proudfoot in an England backroom reshuffle.

Proudfoot and fellow new arrival Simon Amor are added to backroom team for the 2020 Six Nations which includes John Mitchell and Steve Borthwick.

Borthwick, who has been linked with a return to club rugby, has switched roles to skills coach.

Proudfoot, a South African-born former Scotland international, has left the world champions after more than three years in his role there to take a similar role on Jones’ staff.

Jones said: “The Six Nations 2020 is a fresh start for the team so that is how we have approached our coaching staff.

“With Neal Hatley moving to Bath we felt we needed to regenerate the forwards coaching area. Matt Proudfoot has had an outstanding coaching career to date culminating in being a World Cup-winning coach with South Africa.

“He brings great technical expertise and knowledge having coached in South Africa and Japan and having played in Scotland and South Africa. We feel he can take the forwards to another level and build on the great work Neal and Steve have done over the last four years.”

Proudfoot said: “England is probably the best team in world rugby to coach. Having coached against them you get to respect their identity so to get the opportunity to be part of that is a huge honour and privilege.

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“I am really grateful to Eddie, the rest of the coaching staff and the RFU to be given this chance. It is a decision I take with great humility and responsibility and know there is a huge legacy to live up to.

“I look forward to taking that challenge on and doing England proud.”

Amor will take up the role as attack coach after leaving his position as head of the England Sevens men’s and women’s programme.

He has been head coach of England Men’s Sevens for seven years and was also appointed by Great Britain for the 2016 Olympics where they won a silver medal.

Jones said: “We have had our eyes on Simon for a while. We used him in the run up to the Rugby World Cup in some of our training camps. I have been very impressed with his dynamism, his rugby intellect and he will bring a fresh view on how we build our attack.

“We have done some great things under Scott Wisemantel and we will always be forever grateful for the work he did, but we are excited about Simon coming in and what he is going to bring.”

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Amor said: “I love my country and I love coaching. This opportunity to work at the highest level for my country is something I am incredibly passionate about and I am honored to be joining Eddie’s coaching team. The things I am most excited about are being able to learn in this environment and having an opportunity to help improve some great players and the team.

“I’m also keen to work closely with the Premiership club coaches, keep improving and getting better myself, further developing what I’ve learned in my career so far.”

Amor has joined Jones full-time but will return briefly to his duties as head coaches of England and GB Sevens until after the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.