Neil Craig is crossing codes after being appointed as the new head of high performance with England's rugby union team.

Craig, who has spent four decades here in Australia as a player and coach, will join with England coach Eddie Jones as a consultant, focusing on the development of player leadership and coaches.

Jones told the England Rugby website it was a sign of the team being "quite progressive".

"We’ve got Neil Craig who’s an ex-AFL coach coming in as a consultant for highest performance to look how we operate and see how we can improve," he said.

“We’re being quite progressive in that area I think.

“We want the environment to be the best in the world and to do that we continually have to bring in people who have got more knowledge than we’ve got."

The 61-year-old will join up with England as the squad travels to Portugal.

Craig played 319 games for Norwood, Sturt and North Adelaide before becoming Norwood's coach in 1991.

He then joined the Crows in 1997, taking over the senior role in 2004 when Gary Ayres left and taking them to five consecutive years, including two preliminary finals and a minor premiership.

He then spent three years at Melbourne - including 11 games as caretaker coach - from 2011 to 2013, two years at Essendon and a further two years at Carlton, before retiring at the end of the 2017 season.