52 missed tackles and 22 handling errors in Origin - sounds like a knockonathon game of touch and pass.

You miss potentially the best back rower of them Mark Flannaghan - plays week in week out in the NRL given him two years and he will be at Ellis' level - superb prospect

Did you miss the title of the thread

flanagan seems to be a tackling machine when he was at wigan last year.

Caught a few games of his this year and his attack seems to be developing and he's beginning to look like a real top quality player.

It actually wouldnt suprise me if we saw an all wests back row with burgess moving upto prop, and peacock and morley as sub props, that would be some pack consisting of

8. graham
9. sinfield
10. burgess
11. flanagan
12. ellis
13. O'Loughlin

14. Joel Tomkins
15. Adrian Morley
16. Jamie Peacock
17. James Roby

that pack has a great mix of youth and experience.

I haven't seen him play for wests, but I did pull this off their website following their game against the doggies. Credit to Flanaghan for making a fist of it, which he obviously is, but I think England's a decent way off at the moment, especially given the talent we've got in the forwards already.

Not much difference at all between the games really.
The two comps have been nearly equal for a long time.......


When did GB / England win a series against Oz again?
Was it the last World Cup where England had by far the best pack in the World?
Last year where Australia carved England up in the first half of their first encounter and then put the pedal down in the second half of the final?


Ellis and Burgess are fine players and fit into the NRL pretty well they are also the absolute best England have.

When you have to take Widdop with two first grade games to his name as first choice Full back it says it all.


The game is miles apart in all aspects and the fact players that can not get a start in the NRL can be Supermen in SL shows that.

Tomkins and Eastmond have done hardly anything at Test level at this stage so why keep banging on about them.

Time will tell.

And yet some players who emerge from the NRL hailed as Supermen fail miserably in the UK. Some players who get released by SL clubs because they're past their best go back to Australia and still get regular games in the NRL.

Still, I wouldn't expect a balanced view from you.

This rot does grate, why aren't wet allowed to say the slightest thing positive about our game without the like of you doom and gloomers wittering on.

No, we're not as good as Australia, we know that, but guys like you act like we lose every game to them a hundred to nil.
Mark Flanaghan has proved you don't have to be a superstar to carve out an NRL career, and Ellis and Burgess are considered amongst the comp's elite. As for them being by far our best players, well there's plenty who'd argue otherwise, although I'm sure you'd come back with the argument - [iyou can't say that as they haven't proved them selves in the NRL[/i.
You're also the same guys that reckon we only beat the kiwis because of the players they have missing and that the Aussies don't take the WCC seriously (unless they win).

lets name some talented nrl players :

benji marshall, darren lockyer, greg inglis, billy slater, jarred hayne, thurston

SL hasnt gotten a single player that is fit to lace their boots

in the forwards however id say its evenly matched

ive been saying for years englands / SL forwards are on par with the nrls

but in terms of backs you just dont have any that rate really

number of nrl players in england > 100
number of english players in nrl : 3

That's a pretty fair view.
However Eastmond WILL be in that category. He's still a kid and he's that good.
He'd walk into any NRL team tomorrow and can play anywhere from 1-7.
Tomkins imo is still a bit behind, his decision making isn't good enough yet imo
I've also a lot of time for T Briscoe, he's still a teenager isn't he? but has been around a while now and has all the qualities of a top class back.
They are coming.. it's just taken SL clubs faaarrr too long to realise where you need to put your funding.

The difference is consistent intensity.

When Wigan, Warrington, Leeds and Saints meet each other the levels of intensity are far higher than in many other SL games and probably similar to NRL (no offence intended to other teams and I've picked those four just as my example). Therefore those players in top SL teams are used to high intensity NRL-esque RL, just not on such a regular basis. Flanagan only played a handful of first team games at Wigan, and Ellis and Burgess have had NO problems becoming 2 of the best in the NRL - I doubt any players from a soft or vastly inferior competition would have made that transition so easily. It's just that the NRL has more quality throughout than the SL.

And ffs, Tomkins and Eastmond are brand spanking new to Test level - though they have performed admirably so far - certainly when taking into account their ages and that they are relative newcomers to consistent top level RL.

It's because your currency is worthless, that's all.

eastmond has real potential

heard about the other but not seen em so cant talk.

on forwards :

graham, peacock off the top of my head would kill it in the nrl.

our currency almost reached parity with the most important nation in the world

and our economy is booming unlike europe which goes from crises to crisis

aaawww look at the convicts spitting their dummy out...

Graham definately, he's a better prop than Burgess imo (who i knows playing back row over there). Peacock's past his best imo now. Still a top player but the only way is down from here, same with Morley.
Joel Tomkins is a LOT better than Mark Flanagan, and O'Loughlins better than him imo, I just wish he wasn't injured everytime an International series comes along. Sam Tomkins.. don't know how you've not come accross him to be fair, he scored 4 against France t'other day.
Briscoe.. he played in the 4 nations before being subbed at half time when Aus were tearing our right to pieces. Bit unfair to sub the 18/19 year old winger but hey ho, definately one of the best back prospects in a long time. Ridiculously powerful, actually reminds me of a much, much bigger Chris Hicks

i was gonna answer this when i saw it this morning....but thought i'd wait till after origin II cos i thought the result of that game would better illustrate my point better...

theres gonna be far to many NSW players in the australian team at the end of the year and thats pegging them back and thats why they've struggled on occassion to beat us and NZ...put roos jerseys on the 17 queenslanders out there today and they would tank us and NZ.....

? The australian game has regressed because there are too many NSW players? That doesn't make sense. It's like saying England are now better than past years because there are more yorkshiremen in the team.

So, why do you see it as the Aussies dropping rather than competition improving?

SL is on midnight on sunday and monday nights so i dont watch much

they dont pick australian teams for november in june

well maybe they should

Ah that one. Noble only played kids when his hand was forced through injuries. Sam Tomkins was behind the pecking order of Tim Smith! Shaun Ainscough scored four tries against Wakefield and then was dropped the following week. Joel Tomkins was nearly released. I really could go on.

Talk is (or was earlier in the season) that Mike MaGuire saw him more as a centre. He's pushed him out there a few times this season.

why its not as if england are beating us.

other than the kiwis fluking the odd win, nothing much has changed