The Australia coach was in a buoyant mood after watching his side put Six Nations challengers Ireland to the sword on Saturday with an emphatic 45-16 victory in Perth.
The Wallabies were expected to show signs of rust following their end-of-season break, but soon found their stride with a devastating second-half performance against the Irish and their six tries to one win has fuelled talk of a walkover against Wales in Sydney this weekend.
However, Jones is well aware of Wales coach Hansen from his highly successful time in the Super 12 with Canterbury and his assistant Scott Johnson from their stint together with Australia A against the 2001 British Lions and reckons their rugby know-how will make for an intriguing tactical duel.
‘Technically, Wales are one of the most advanced teams in the world, so will pose a very different challenge to Ireland,’ said Jones.
‘With Steve Hansen and Scott Johnson in charge, they have two guys who think deeply about the game and they really work to come up with specific game plans to exploit any weaknesses in the teams they play.
‘So we will definitely need to sharpen up and improve on our performance against Ireland. We were a bit rusty, as was probably to be expected, but we will be looking to step up another gear.’
Despite only bringing the squad together for the first time of their season last week, Jones has already been doing his homework and despite a record run of seven consecutive defeats, he believes Wales are packed with potential.
And he singled out three of Wales’ brightest young prospects – Gareth Cooper, Rhys Williams and Robert Sidoli – to emerge as future stars in the game.
‘Wales’ lineout is working very well and is probably one of the most efficient around at the moment, a lot of that is down to Sidoli who looks very promising,’ said Jones.
‘I have also been particularly impressed by the young scrum-half Cooper who already looks a quality player and the full-back Williams who also looks very sharp on his feet and could be a real threat.
‘Wales had a disappointing Six Nations Championship but the last video of them that I watched was the game against Ireland in Cardiff when Ronan O’Gara booted that field (drop) goal in the last minute.
‘Perhaps they took one or two wrong options in that game but when you are down it those sort of tight games that always seem to go against you.
‘But with some very good young players coming through you can see that Wales are going to be a very good team. So we aren’t taking anything for granted.
‘We want to keep improving with every game.’
