Everyone knew the former Wales wing would be taking over the reins at the Swansea.Com Stadium at the end of the season, but he has gained an earlier than expected promotion to the head coach role in the wake of the record European defeat in Montpellier last weekend.
That 59-15 scoreline precipitated the departure of Booth and has left Jones with the not inconsiderable task of raising morale ahead of one of the biggest games of the season – the West Wales derby!
The fact the Scarlets are heading 11 miles up the road to tackle their biggest rivals will mean Jones will have no problem in lifting his players, but adding to the intrigue and pressure will be the fact Jones played all his rugby at the Scarlets and kick-started his coaching career with them.
Having first dabbled in coaching at his hometown club Builth Wells when he was re-habbing a knee injury, he has embarked on a meandering journey since 2010 in pursuit of coaching experience and knowledge.
There were five years as a skills and back coach at the Scarlets, a year as backs coach with Wales, a year as head coach at Rotherham in the English Championship, three years in charge of RGC 1404, some World Cup experience with Namibia working under Phil Davies and then a year in New Zealand as backs and attack coach with the Crusaders and Canterbury.
He returned to join Worcester Warriors as a defence coach in their final year and last year became interim head coach of Wales U20 at the World Rugby U20 Championships. He then became the Ospreys defence coach.
When you can’t play anymore the closest thing you can get is helping people who do play. The joy you get after seeing the faces in the changing room on the back of a good win is powerful.
“I love coaching, even though I never thought I would when I was playing. It’s a little bit of a drug,” said the 45-year-old Jones.
“Even though you have moments like last week, when you feel like nothing can get much worse from a job perspective, the highs still outweigh the lows. I’ve taken something from everywhere I’ve been.
“I’ve had to make sacrifices in my coaching journey, like driving four-and-a-half hours up to north Wales and then the same journey back and getting home too late to put the kids to bed. Those moments test you and let you know whether you really love the job, or just like it.
“The family made a sacrifice in coming all the way to New Zealand with me. That was huge and it showed me that I don’t just love this life, I love it.
“I’m looking forward to this new role. I’ve loved just focusing on the detail in one specific area like attack or defence, now I’ve got to expand my horizons.
“I still have to be very detailed in all those areas, but my responsibility now is knitting all those areas together.”
Now he is taking on the biggest job of his career and he kicks off by opposing one of his life-long friends and teammates, Dwayne Peel. So, what type of head coach is he going to be?
Scarlets head coach Dwayne Peel first played with Jones at the age of 18
“I will be honest in my work ethic and be straight down the line with my players. My job now for the players is to develop and grow the environment to take it to hopefully take it to the next level,” said the 45-year-old Jones.
“I don’t see my life changing in terms of expectation, although there will be a slight spike in workload with us being a coach down in the building. Day to day nothing is going to change.
“We’re going to evolve the team, any coach would tell you he wants to do that, but what we won’t be doing is making wholesale changes because of what has happened. I want to evolve things slowly.
“It means added workload, taking an eye on both sides of the ball and dealing a little bit more with players around selection than you normally would. But my behaviour and attitude to the job will be exactly the same as it was.
“I’m excited about the role and it is a great opportunity for me to experience something different. Basically, the transition period has been shortened and my new role as head coach has been brought forward – these things happen in professional sport.”
Having been named ahead of the start of the season as the man who would succeed Booth when his contract expired at the end of the current season, Jones had been planning ahead in his mind. But he hadn’t planned for the scenario that presented itself earlier in the week.
“I was really surprised when I got the call to have a discussion to see what I felt about taking on the head coach role if I was needed to. The first thought that came into my head was about Toby and his emotions,” added Jones.
“It’s tough because he has given so much to the region. He has done a really good job, and I enjoyed my time working with him – we had a very good relationship.
“After that I started thinking about the job in hand, the responsibility to the badge and switching the focus onto the game this weekend.
“The players have reacted as you would have expected. There was a brief period of contemplation about what it might mean to them individually and to the team in the short term.”
As the team’s defence coach it wasn’t much fun in Montpellier watching his side concede nine tries. He admits to it being a painful experience, but not one that defines his team or him.
“There was no one thing to pin last weekend’s result on. It simply wasn’t us,” he said.
“Montpellier are the most dominant ball carrying team in the Top 14 and we allowed them to use their collision dominance far too easily through a lack of ill-discipline around our set piece and open field rucks.
“They took the game away from us in the first 30 minutes and that forced us to chase the game. When that happens, you force things and make errors, and they punish you off transition.
“We had a couple of blow outs like that last season when the scoreboard got ugly, but I know the response was often very strong from us. I’m expecting another good response because it wasn’t an emotional problem, it was all down to our accuracy.
“It was uncomfortable last week and as the guy heading up that area, I felt responsible. It was painful because it didn’t represent the quality of this group.
“I’ve been around long enough to know you are not defined by one off games, you are defined by your body of work. The body of work this group has shown me on the defensive side I’ve been here has been very good.
“Up until last weekend we were ahead of last season on tries conceded per game. We have been tracking OK in that area, but we need to be better and I’m confident we will be this weekend.”
