For me Tomkins has not backed up the hype surrounding him.
Poor under the high ball and, for me, has not tried to inject himself into the attacking line enough against Australia and New Zealand, particularly when the game has been close.
The best players pull of big plays at vital moments. Tomkins has blown it at vital moments.
However, he's still got a lot of developing to do and could become world class, he just isn't yet.

It was a cringe worthy comment. Yes it was a difficult kick, but world class full-back should catch them. He looks very supect under the high ball. Hopefully he will work on it.

the main thing that disappointed me was that i didn't see him explode into the line once. Although Chase & Sinfield have to take some blame for this.

sam was targeted and then lost confidence. he behaved as he did toward the end of the super league season when he wasnt 100% the uncatchable ball comment was silly, unnecessary and i doubt sam himself would have spouted such had he been asked about it

Most people seem to be wanting to apportion blame at the moment, as is customary on this site. But really, time for perspective!

Tomkins was disappointing, especially after the previous two games in which he always looked a threat, and IMO, world class. He seems to have a problem with high balls against dominant opposition, and perhaps a different player would have done better. But there is no-one else for England who can do what Tomkins can on attack. He's young, hasn't played FB for long, and will iron out these problems in his game. After this series I'm more convinced than ever that he should have won Man of Steel this season, despite my original preference being Roby - still some motivation left for him for next season.

The reason he had a quiet game was simple - the forward battle was lost, and compounded by England making a string of basic errors, starting with the stupid ball-steal attempt from Sinfield. This meant Tomkins had no space when he got the ball, and was only going to get clattered. Sinfield wasn't great but he was playing under the same pressures too - people criticising Sinfield for not passing enough to Tomkins are deluded - it wouldn't have made a difference. The half backs were always going to struggle in these circumstances.

It seems to me that the current England team has the best back line we've seen for some time, but the forwards aren't quite as good as they have been in recent years. Perhaps it was just one game too far for the old warhorses Morley and Peacock. We needed a bit more dynamism, which Burgess would have usually provided. I thought Ellis was disappointing for someone who is allegedly good enough for State of Origin. JJB and Wilkin did OK but are probably a bit too small.

No point reading too much into individual performances I suppose. Whilst the pack put down the platform at Wembley, allowing the likes of Tomkins and Briscoe to play, they failed to do this at Elland Road. That's why we were never really in it - not doing the basics in the first half took too much out of the side in terms of defensive energy expenditure, and it was always going to be a matter of time before Australia cut loose.

At least we have a core group players who have performed well in this series and will be there in the future - Tomkins, Roby, Reed, Hall, Briscoe, Graham, plus Burgess and maybe Widdop at the bare minimum. But more is obviously needed. Including perhaps a new coach. McNamara has done really well this time around, but I wonder if he really is the sort of coach to take England any further.

Sam was poor under the bomb yesterday because of the quality of the kicks which were superb although nothing is uncatchable imo and also the quality of the pressure from the opposition which was superb also.

He caught bombs for fun all season in super league and even turned some of them into tries but thats more down to the bombs not being as good and also the pressure not as good imo.

This is why we will always struggle against the Aussies because they are used to very high intensity and quality every week in the NRL but in super league half the teams are just fodder imo.

I seem to recall Wellens, for example, catching Lockyer's high kicks.

Tomkins wasn't great but he did have a difficult job. He has to make a standing jump while the Aussie chasers had a running start. It's obvious that they have the advantage in that situation. The ones that he didn't get close to are an issue but he's only 22. Everyone is praising Ryan Hall for his excellent performances but he's been crap at international level until this year. Young players make mistakes, they just have to make sure they work hard to improve.

The one time Darius Boyd faced a kick of the sort that Lockyer and Thurston were putting up was at Wembley, where Sinfield put up a lovely high kick that Reed was able to chase and Boyd made a real mess of that one. He's barely been tested since that moment.

I may be forgetting things but when exactly has he been "crap" in previous years?

hello phil

you're not doing yourself any favours here....and i still have a few pages left to read.

Basically we've got no chance of ever catching the Aussies up now they've worked out how to put up bombs that come down [iat an angle[/i.

Thats because he is a conventional full back who played that position for a long time and was very good at it. Sam Tomkins hasnt played there that long yet and is still improving.

Like i said if he was so bad under the high ball he would of been shown up a lot more in super league but theres nobody in the same world as Lockyer obviously. Watch people try and bomb him in super league next season and they will pay the price when he returns the ball with interest.

To the original poster who mentioned Phil Clarke's comments, even i cringed when he said it was uncatchable. I just cant see how any ball is uncatchable unless you cant get to it in time.

Interesting. That being the case you'd think the kicker would just keep hold of the ball himself since he's standing where it's going to end up.

Wasn't uncatchable but was a cracking spiralling kick with great support from his front runners. Basically a kick that we didn't replicate once in the whole game despite them hitting several.

Whatever Phil. It was an atrocious attempt, and not the only one he made.

Dear Mrs Tomkins,

If you are wondering what little Sammy may be wanting for Christmas this year........may I suggest you pop these in his stocking!

Looked to me like he didn't want to pick up an injury before turning out for the Barbarians at RU.

Our protection of the FB was poor at best all night, the Cons knew the danger and worked hard to minimise it whilst attacking the potential weakness.
Again we were slaughtered in decision making.

Still, a step up from the first one at Wembley which he didn't even bother making an attempt for...

What I want to see at international level is a player like Lockyer firstly putting up a devilishly cunning high bomb, spinning and spiralling the like of which you hardly ever see.

But then once I've finished admiring that, I want to see the opposition fullback put in a similar international class effort and miraculously catch it and turn defence into attack.

So I can watch open-mouthed at Lockyer's brilliance, and then gasp in admiration at the fullback's counter-brilliance.

What I sadly saw Tomkins do twice on Saturday and before that against NZ, was just make a total porridge of the kick, the first two he basically ended up making no attempt to catch whatsoever. Lockyer had not tied Tomkins' arms to his sides so sadly the conclusion is it was just terrible play by Tomkins.

One half of the show (Lockyer's kick) was international class; sadly the other half (Tomkins' "attempt", which it can only loosely be called) was rubbish.

couldn't have put it better but this is the amazing sam tomkins remember he can do no wrong!!!!!!!!

Funny thread.

For what it's worth, in my opinion, Lockyer has (had) the most difficult bomb in the world.

My club fullback, Josh Dugan, is great under a high ball. He got absolutely bombarded by Lockyer in Origin I and...oh, defused every single one. Nevermind.

Tomkins is an awesome player, potential superstar. I was very impressed with what I saw this Four Nations, my estimation of him has certainly risen. But compared with NRL fullbacks, he's still very much in the thick of it.

People talk about his youth, but Kevin Locke, for example, is the same age. The aforementioned Dugan, is a year younger. He's got the keep up with these young players (among others) before we can talk as highly about him as many already do. The absence of Slater for almost the whole tournament robbed the audience of a decent yardstick to compare, and no doubt an added spectacle.

Was Tomkins injured? He looked like it to me with a general lack of activity in the game in not getting to the high balls and when returning kicks he always passed it to another of the back 3 instead of returning it himself. Which is a shame because he's obviously very dangerous when returning the kicks. Didn't he pick up a knock against France?

Sam has a lot of talent, which will mean he can have weaknesses and still be considered a top performer, because of the slightly questionable all round ability of the SL professional compared to the NRL. Basically, he'll get away with dropping a few balls in SL that he wouldn't down under, because he can go up the other end and score one straight back.

If he's injured surely he wouldn't be playing RU at the weekend?

He failed to get to the pitch of high balls in the other matches too. Maybe he has a problem with his binocular vision - a gammy eye, eyes too close together, etc?

For what it's worth, I believe Australia had spotted a weakness there - hence the high kicks, which also gave the chasers time to stop him running the ball back. I had expected Oz to pressurise him at Wembley in some way - but they chose to kick to the wingmen instead. It was therefore inevitable they'd try to pressurise him in the final and based on a weakness they had perceived in other games.