If shenton had have come through with senior and gleeson he wouldn't even get a look in. Not in the same class, never will be one of the great English centres in my opinion unlike Schofield, Lydon, newlove, Senior.

Because he would have been sin-binned, and rightly so.

Cameron Smith chipping the ball back to himself doesn't put it back in play.

The ball is not back in play after the penalty is awarded until the referee blows his whistle or otherwise indicates play on. Archer was waiting for Darren Lockyer to decide what he wanted to do with the penalty before he did so.

If he had rattled him down, I doubt the ref would have sin-binned him.

Misunderstandings happen.

My MOM award goes to Phil Clarke, who once again availed us with his devestating knowledge of the game, "it's started raining, that should suit England". Of course it will Phil, SL players never make mistakes in wet weather. Cue the England fumbleathon and the Australian points avalanche.

It doesn't matter how highly certain players are rated by their fans, we could have 13 supermen out on then pitch, but if they can't control the ball then they won't win a game. I've been watching English/British players making the same basic mistakes under prerssure for nearly 30 years. When we play mistake free, we can win games, but mistake free football barely exists when British players pull on an international shirt. It's like collecting all the sloppiest players in SL and expecting them to beat the tidiest players in the southern hemisphere. To be fair, NZ have the same issue to an lesser extent. When they play mistake free they can actually blow Australia away, when they don't they can get embarrased just like us.

I thought the pack played okay, but Tomkins (J) is a great big pudding and clearly nowhere near international class, but when Burgess drops the ball while trying to simply play it you can't really get on top. Backs are what they are - crap. Atkins is a complete liability - what was the point in us putting together a greaty passing movement to bring the ball out of our half when that muppett tries to take Billy Slater on the outside and ends up in touch and turning the ball over? The wingers were non-existant and the other Tomkins telegraphed his every attack.

Phil Clarke was perhaps half right, when the heavens did really open it kept the Australians under a cricket score.

One crumb of comfort. After visiting the Sydney Football Stadium 20 years ago and getting soaked under the "roof" that was supposed to vortex rain away from the spectators I see the Aussies have still yet to master the art of putting a roof on a stadium that actually performs it's primary function - keeping the f*****g rain off the crowd.

Great post mate! On the money. I wasn't quite as harsh about tomkin Joel. But he is a massive disappoint and ineffective at this level. looked well out of his depth.

What a sad indictment: a " reasonably competitive team " ....does that really make you happy ? Gleeson nor Bridge would have made any difference. We have to stop pretending...

Who genuinely gets excited at or relishes an "international" unless it's between Oz and NZ ? P N G ? Be serious. World Cup ? Come on. Farcical.

I would much more pay to see eg Leeds, Saints, Auckland, Catalans, Rabbitohs etc in some sort of extended club challenge......where we have much more possibility of seeing hopefully much more competitive matches.

Same old story really wasn't it? It highlights so many fundamental issues with SL and British league yet again.

Lack of FUNDAMENTALS such as ball control under the slightest pressure. That simply highlights the fact that in SL teams don't get punished enough for making mistakes. If they did, all players would be control the ball better, and you'd certainly expect our best players to be mainly error-free.

Inability to read what are bog standard attacking plays in the NRL. That would be hard to understand until you watch England with the ball. Absolutely no structure of note. No setting up a set of 6 to a plan. Centres who have almost literally no idea what lines to run, how to put a defence in two minds or set up a a winger. If they can't run the plays themseleves it probably shouldn't surprise anyone that they can't defend against them.

Dreadfully poor kicking game. This is one I simply don't understand. Even in SL this ought to be an important skill.

Lack of fitness. We are always being told we match the Aussies in this regard, but to me our teams simply don't look not as fit or dynamic as Aus/NZ.

Lack of athletes in the backs. Some of our threequarters look like donkeys amongst thoroughbreds.

....and the list goes on.

We could just fold the tent and walk away from internationals, but I for one want to see England competitive and enjoy watching tests. At the moment its just a sense of foreboding followed by the usual claptrap about closing the gap after we've been handed our a*ses again. In the Aussie press they've thrown around words like 'bumbling', 'incompetent' and 'humiliation' - and who can blame them?

The only way to get better is to do something different. Short-term there's virtually nothing we can do but get more British players in the NRL, particularly backs. I'd also seriously scour both the NRL and SL for England-qualified Aussies. In the long-term though it comes down to the old chestnuts of player development and overseas players in SL.

More British players in the NRL would just mean we would be even more devoid of talent to watch here.... As I said - depressing though it is - we have to stop pretending. Spectators want to see unpredictable competitive outcomes... At club level we have a good product helped by the antipodean influx and the WCC shows success in that respect. We should build on success.

Because the last time we picked 'em against Aus, we lost 52-4.

If we could arrange an extended WCC where all games are played at the home of the SL clubs and the NRL clubs are all forced to arrive in the UK a couple of days before each game during their off-season with ball and chain attached to each players leg, then yes... we might be a bit more competitive and successful.

We need to get more of our players going out to play in the NRL and there's probably quite a few that would make it given the chance but most of them if not all would be forwards IMO and it would weaken the SL.
Would many of the backs currently playing in SL get in an NRL side? I'm not sure they would. Take Tomkins for example, how many NRL teams would he get in if he went over there? They've all got FB's that are better than him like Slater, Stewart, Hayne, Bowen, Boyd etc and the younger ones like Dugan and Coote are as good. I honestly dont think any of our backs would get a game in the first teams over there. Then there's the wages, they'll earn more over here being some of the better players for their club than they would if they went to an NRL team and be a reserve.
The Aussies will always be better simply because of the size of the game over there and the amount of kids they have playing the game compared to over here.

....or we could just forget it all, accept the game's limitations in the Northern hemisphere, stop embarrasing expansion plans even into our principality, ban NRL from our TV's to compare SL to, and remain 'happy' in splendid isolation.

I just think we are kidding ourself when people think we are getting better quoting we lost by 52 points 2 years ago. We were rubbish then and we are rubbish now, There is a massive gulf in quality of basic skills and a strength in depth. The team this year was depleated with some injuries and the players we brought in were very steady and nowhere near the level needed. SOL in the number 6 shirt was a joke, as was brown and Tompkins looked well out of his depth. The props were all poor, with the exception of Graham who although not the most dynamic can always be relied on. Thought the back row was where we were strongest and most agressive, but all the back positions were a joke.

Reasonably competitive would be an improvement on recent times and a step in the right direction.



Me. I went to the last World Cup in Oz and was very excited. As I was for the Tri Nations out there in 2006. As I was on Sunday morning when I got out of bed despite a monster hangover.



Hopefully the RFL don't give up on international RL as easily as some England supporters.

"Well if we can't win, I'm not going to watch."

What a pathetic, childish attitude.

Agreed FTV, given England's results against Australia and the Kiwis in 2008 and 2009 this year has been a marked improvement. If you wanted to split hairs you could argue that the Aussies in particular aren't as strong as they were in either of those tournaments, but neither are England with key players missing.

Keep trying, it's all we can do. However, I anticipate plenty more pain to come. Sam Tompkins is regarded by many to be England's best young prospect in the backs. While this may well be true I can't honestly see him, or any other emerging full back centre, scrum half or stand off, attaining the standard required to compete with kangaroos or kiwis.

Ask yourself, why is this the case?

Purely and simply that in order to be a megastar in the SL competition they don't have to attain those standards. They can happily get to a level where they are one of the best players in the competition then put their feet up rather than have to run to stand still as they would in the NRL.

TBH I can't see us winning the four nations or any equivilent competition in my lifetime.

It was only a few years ago that rather than compete with the Kiwis, we whitewashed them 3-0 over a series. We've done it before and will do it again.

The fact that we were whitewashing the kiwis a few years ago is null and void. That was before they were really supplying the NRL with some high quality players and competing at such a level week in week out.

Kicking game is a big part of the problem. At least by controlling a team with pinpoint kicking and a good chase you can minimise their chances in the red zone. I don't think there are many better english players at kicking a team to death than Sinfield when he is on form, but beyond that I can not think of many others.

Was Ryan Hall still injured on Sunday?

IMO Cudjoe looked promising at times.

You see, there, right there, is the whole problem in a nutshell. We do not have a good product at all, not by any standards. We have a crap product that is so brilliantly mass marketed, with brain washed spectators who believe every word that "Pinky and the Brain" tell them. This is evidenced every time we come up against a really good product. Can you honestly, hand on heart, tell me that Castleford V Wakefield is a good product, played with a high level of skill and intensity?

Until we realise that our own domestic standards are in fact shocking, we will not improve one jot on the international stage.

Sinfield has been off form in terms of field kicking for some time now IMO. Again IMO the most consistent field kicker in the league is Brough at Huddersfield. He is also the type of Scrum Half that would revel in international football.

In a nutshell. And one club supporters are so blind to their own players' shortcomings that they applaud them for it.

I wouldn't dispute that. My point is that it's likely to be some considerable time before it happens again. My guess is maybe 5-8 years minimum. Yours is?