Shame we didn't win, but it's been good to see a competitive England side in the last two games. A poor decision and the width of a post from winning.

Widdop's a good stand-off, for the NRL.

Error free, organised, defends well.

He's got all the flair of a beige wall though. If he and Smith are England's future at half-back, they'll continue to struggle to score enough points to put teams away.

Would it make more sense to partner Widdop with Sam Tomkins and use Hardaker at Fullback?

Widdop needs to develop more in terms of try-scoring passes and choosing when to run. He's a bit 'Ben walker' at the moment - looks the part but not a gamebreaker. He had the same problem for the Dragons this year as well. Even if he doesn't develop more than he is today he's a good cool presence in the middle of the field and if he was partnered with a running halfback he'd be a superb foil. His one-on-one defence has lapses, but he reads the game superbly well and does a lot of mopping up close to the line.

In terms of future development, I really hope Tomkins moves into the halves, as this would allow him to play to his strengths when England have the ball, and lose his weaknesses when we don't have it, particularly if Hardaker maintains his form. Otherwise we just have to hope a young halfback with real class comes through.

The only other changes are hopefully Burgess forcing his way into the side, Watkins improving his defence and far more from the second row. Farrell improved a bit over the course of the series, but second row was an area england were fourth best in the tournament.

Overall we did as well as I hoped before the tournament - competed for 80 minutes against both Australia and NZ on their turf. That hasn't been true for a decade or more. Calls for McNamara to be turfed are ridiculous - we've seen steady improvement during his tenure and if he'd had Roby and Sam Burgess available I don't think its exaggerating to say we'd be in the final with some ease.

The only lessons I think he can take are making sure we play a warm-up game so he's able to utilise the full squad, and generally being more bold - both in selections and team tactics.

For all the talk of us been miles behind the others. I just can't get away from the position that putting Roby, Sam Burgess, and Danny Brough in that side, we would be more than just a match for either New Zealand or Australia. We are simply not that far off.

Looking forward to next years New Zealand series already, wonder if we will get to host a test at HQ.
Probably Huddersfield, Hull & Wigan will get em.

and Westwood. Takes a good front row and turns it into a monster pack with very little weakness.

For me none of our flair players have enough cutting edge. Watkins seemed to struggle in both defense and attack. Tomkins Whilst not bad did but have the intact with the ball that I expected.

Overall I am pleased with the progress and barring one or two the cute well be aeons for a few years

I hate auto correct on my phone

I don't think Danny Brough has the temperament for test matches. Agree apart from that. As the Eagle said, Westwood would help.

That said, Australia had better players missing than we did. So we're probably not far off NZ, but still a fair way off Australia.

I think we have got to the point now of being able to compete with Australia even with their best side which is a big enough stride to take in itself.We really did miss an big opportunity this time, forget the 'no try' debacle,had we carried on the first half game plan and taken it to OZ instead of going into our shell for half an hour i have no doubt we would have won handily.

We can match the Kiwis best as proved yesterday and will have a big opportunity to confirm that next year in the test series over here.Will be interesting to see who Australia have in line to succeed the likes of Cam Smith,Thurston and Slater, massive part of our destruction over the last decade, who are all coming into their 30's now and can't have too much left in the tank at international level.2 of them were missing this series and we have seen how vulnerable they were. Australia always have find top players to take over, always have as long as i have watched RL, but these 3 all at once should leave us with a bit of a window to take advantage.

Should be an interesting few years to come which i am for once in along time looking forward to with genuine hope rather than trepidation.

Re, Brough, many people thought that Sarginson would struggle at this level but he's adapted very well to it and had a decent solid tournament.

ATEOTD Brough has not been given a fair crack of the whip and in guess the way he has reacted to not be selected has put a few peoples noses out of joint.

But if you were the reigning man of steel who had just had an absolute stormer of a season and you don't even make the squad I reckon you'd be a touch pished off too.

I don't think England would have faired any better or worse had Brough been selected. Great season last year, average season this time. A bit like our centre & 2nd row predicament there are plenty of very good options, but hardly any stand out world class ones

Brough would've spat his dummy out and sulked had he been on the end of all those late hits on the kicker.

Sarginson was just a bit inexperienced, that's why people like me (wrongly) thought he wasn't ready.

Danny Brough has gone hiding in too many big games for me. If MoS wasn't chosen before he s**t out in the play-offs, that honour would be missing from his CV. IMO, obviously.

He has the ability, but not the attitude.

Roby was a big miss, Clarke impressed me Saturday, but we lost all attacking shape when he went off, and that was not the fault of Ferris ( who should have been in the team from the start on merit anyway).
Not sure why Watkins has gotten so much stick. He wa getting the ball late or not at all, the kiwis came in and cut off all good ball to our right as we had no depth when attacking that way. Also, all England's quick ball went left, we missed some glaring mis-matches on the right. And but for a foot just in touch he nearly created something magical at the end.

What we really have a problem with is that we don't know how to win. It's gone, you can almost see it in the players. There is no belief.
You can moan about minor team selection but I don't think we could have put much better from what was avaable on the field. They all worked themselves into the ground and I'm proud if the effort they hav shown the whole tournament. But they don't know how to win a game and when it comes to tight matches they don 't have the belief.

I don't know how you fix that.

I think Watkins disappointed in the series as he did in the 2nd half of the season for Leeds. We all know he has some silky footwork and has the potential to become international class but he has yet to prove consistency and there are worries over his defense and ability to create enough chances for his winger. He sometimes seems lethargic with a reluctance to go looking for the ball or make the right angled runs. Whereas rookie Sarginson looked the more confident and better centre in both defense and attack.

Sarginson benefitted from England attacking left after every half break or quick PTB near the Kiwi line. Our right side was hindered by slow ball and by lack of depth from link players who were constantly hit behind the gainline before the ball even got to Watkins.
Sarginson did well to draw and pass but his carries with the ball were lacking threat. This is the difference with Watkins. He has threat with the ball in hand and he can put his winger away. I'm baffled by those who seem to think he can't do this or doesn't do this, he has more try assists than any centre in the Superleague apart from Shenton who has one more, and for me Shenton has been as good as, if not better than any other e in the comp this year. Also, Watkins had nobody running tight off his inside shoulder, a criminal offence in my opinion.

Fringe defenders always have higher missed tackle ratios than guys who sit in the middle of the park with player running straight at them all day, and I rather think the fact that Watkins will rarely play against any team in SL with the sort of movement and dummy runners that NZ and Australia employ had soemthing to do with the difficulties he may or may not have experienced. If you want a direct comparisson with Moon for example their SL stats on missed tackle would indicate that from a considerably higher workload Watkins missed less tackles, and nobody criticises Moon's defence.

Watkins is the real deal, but his club coach has to bear some of the responsibility for any declining confidence levels over the last couple of seasons.

Watkins was England's best centre against NZ, when he get's the ball in space he's threatening everytime. He's also had to make 25+ tackles every game which is very high for a centre, and his defence has been OK in general, it was excellent in the WC, and on Saturday. England's lack of punch in the 2nd row is what has hindered England in attack. Because we don't have any threat from the back row, and the players we do have there haven't got much of an offload and don't require the ammount of people to stop them as their NZ counter parts in particular do there isn't the doubt in the defenders mind so they can concentrate on marking the centres and Tomkins.

Agreed, having 2 halves that can't pass to the right didn't really help Watkins & Charnley either.

England didn't have a plan to shift the ball to the right, other than the play with Tomkins out the back which the Kiwis were able to read every time because England never varied it to hit the lead runner and use Tomkins as the decoy.

That was the play. Tomkins out the back getting ball and defender at the same time.

Says a lot about the ability of the England half backs to play what was in front of them that they kept going back to it.

That was nearly as bad as using backs for the first 3 tackles, forwards to drive for the 4th and 5th tackle and the kicking, particularly in the last 10 minutes when we were chasing the game

A whole lot of excuses here.

You say Sarginson's carries with the ball were lacking threat. Well I would say his carries fulfilled his threat as he ran good angles, straightened his line, fainted in then out, drew defenders to get Hall over the line. He looked the better centre in both his games in attack and defense.

Moving to your point that only Shenton of the SL centres made more try assists than Watkins. On scrutiny this is misleading as it does not take into account the number of carries each player makes.

For example Shenton made 17 try assists (TA) in 274 carries (C) with an average TA per C of 16.11. Watkins made 17 TA in 327 Cs averaging 20.43 TA per C. Moon made 15/214 = 14.6 average and Cudjoe 15/237 = 15.8 average or Bridge 17/299 = 17.59 avg.

If you apply this test to the top 50 TAs in SL Watkins comes in at 34th place just pipping the likes of Ferres and a batch of hookers with Hardaker in 46th pace with 13/400 = 30.77 The leaders in SL were averaging 8 to 10 try assists per carry.

You say he can put his winger away, well I am not so sure Charnley or Briscoe would fully agree on present form.

You also compare Watkins with Moon in regard to missed tackles. Again this can be misleading as it only records when a defender has hands on then falls off the attacker. It does not record the times when a player leaves a gap either inside or outside and the attacker speeds through untouched or when a player comes out of the line and leaves a gap. So I do not think that Watkins is being criticised for his commitment in the tackle, which he has improved greatly, but rather his positional judgement. As Mr Jennings will confirm.

Your last point about apportioning blame for "his declining confidence" also is hard to fathom perhaps because as you say you are "baffled" Watkins started this year if the best form (and confidence) of his career. He was superb. However he lost form just before the halfway mark (along with several other teammates) and he never really regained his form.

Despite my comments I am a big Watkins fan and really appreciate his great footwork and balanced running. But I do think he should try to run better angles and vary his depth of run and he does rather give the impression of not fully concentrating sometimes. In mitigation he (and Moon and the wingers) do not have the advantage of a Web style full back who has a linking and passing game to create space and overlaps. Hardaker's game is based on physicality and metre making and IMO too often dies with the ball. This is a big problem for Leeds and is made worse because we lack a running creative player in the halves.

If we do not find a creative running player at 6 or 7 then I would be tempted to move Watkins to fullback where he could be a worldbeater like Inglis.