Paul Gustard turns to other sports to improve England's defence

England defence coach Paul Gustard admitted that he has been broadening his coaching skills with other sports after the third Test against Australia in Sydney in June.

England completed the series whitewash in Australia with a 44-40 victory but their defence left a lot to be desired as they conceded five tries to the Wallabies.

Following the review conducted on the series, Eddie Jones urged the assistant coaches to sharpen their skills by spending time on other sports.

"We didn't coach well enough on tour, so our staff have been working really hard investigating other sports," Jones said.

The former Leicester Tigers lock spent time with New Zealand Warriors, Wigan and Warrington rugby league clubs last summer while also worked with British Judo, to sharpen his skill.

"I worked with Eddie before and knew he would be frank. I don't mind that. I don't want to be an ordinary coach, I want to be the best coach I can be," the defence coach said.

"In the third Test we were off the pace - I was pretty dark after the game. I felt we didn't give a true representation of ourselves.

"I was dark immediately. It's a long time (since) I've been involved in a team that has conceded that many tries in a game.

"Although we got lucky on occasion in the second Test, it was through sheer fight, determination and willingness to defend our line that we gave a true representation of what England rugby is about. The third Test wasn't that.

"We made soft errors and bad decisions off the ball. We put ourselves in compromised positions and against a good team we got burnt and you can't afford to do that."

England have a busy autumn internationals heading their way which begins with a clash against South Africa at Twickenham followed by Tests against Fiji, Argentina and Australia and Gustard is confident of an improved performance.

"My aim going into a game is not to concede any tries or any points. That's the aim, the vision, the dream. The reality doesn't always work out like that," Gustard said.

"We averaged conceding 1.7 tries per game over the summer series, which isn't good enough. I know that, the boys know that.

"We went from conceding four tries in the Six Nations to conceding 10 tries in the summer. We conceded some pretty soft scores but we still conceded them.

"We know we need to bring that down and we believe we can do so with what we've been working on."

Then England training camp in Brighton was given judo training on Monday by British coaches JP Bell and Kate Howey to enhance their breakdown and tackle skills.

"We think there are certain techniques that are transferable to rugby," Gustard said.

"There's natural crossover whenever there is contact, body v body, so areas in and around the tackle, mauling, grappling skills, not just in body manipulation but in terms of low body positions.

"Judo is very flexible. It is an area of the game we think we can make particularly big strides in.

"George Ford was outstanding at it, it must be those long levers he has. Technically he was very good."