The problem is the extra coaching to make them world class would be nullified once they join the England side, Ellis and Burgess being typical examples.

the australian commentators were saying in first half that the outside backs for england were clueless, but young and could learn..they mentioned that they should all move to australia( nrl) for 2 years and learn to play intense rl every week and they could go back as improved players and then make england better as a team

I will defer to you on what coaches in Oz would like to do with leroy's ar5e.

On RL, his line speed was not too quick

The inside defender was so slow it was not true. So slow infact that he could not lay a finger on Lewis at whatever speed he was moving.

I havent defended any other Wigan player, please enlighten me. I have talked about one Wigan player.

Are we not allowed to comment on players from our own clubs when people are talking complete rubbish? Could you point out this rule in the AUP?

I agree Westwood stood out amongst the forwards, Roby played pretty well when he was given the chance to speed the PTB up, not always easy with such a good opposition. Ellis worked hard, I don’t buy all this crap about him going backwards, I think Burgess felt the pressure of hype and made too many mistakes. Graham again had a trademark solid performance. J Tomkins didn’t stand out for me, Lunt didn’t make any impression apart from the no try (correct decision IMHO – just wish a few of the Aussie tries had also been given the correct decision), Crabtree is what he is; a big lump to give some impact, but I’ve no idea what Fielden is for. Coley would have been a better selection than Fielden.

In the backs Atkins showed his limitations, and Cudjoe was unnecessarily exposed at centre, would rather have seen Brown at centre with Cudjoe on the wing. O’Loughlin at SO wasn’t as horrible as it could have been, but he offered little creativity and fairly poor kicking game, so was ultimately a pointless selection. I think Robinson played above himself, but still don’t think he’s good enough for this level, he’s not even the best SH at his own club, and his kicking game isn’t great, which means a halfback partnership where neither has a great kicking game and that’s a big ask at domestic level never mind against Australia.

Briscoe will come good in time; he’s 20 yrs old FFS, not convinced Goulding will ever be anything more than a competent SL winger, hence why I think Cudjoe may have been a better bet alongside Brown at centre. S Tomkins is the most gifted player in that party and the Aussies kept him well contained, yes he’s a bit slight, but I still think he’s the best SO we’ve actually got, which is why at fullback he was wasted when we had such a limited halves partnership. It doesn’t really matter now, but I do think our selections were naïve today, Brown is a better centre than either Atkins or Cudjoe and has a decent(ish) kicking game, Tomkins is a better SO than any other options and we really need that talent more involved. Ultimately we don’t have enough quality in the backs, the injuries to Eastmond and Shenton have cruelly exacerbated that, but we should have been able to deploy what we do have a bit better.

Agree with most of that.

A balanced and fair view.

Cudjoe should have been on the wing and Briscoe should have played at centre. Atkins should not have been on the pitch - a no brainer in every sense.

I stick by the backs line-up I named last week and would like to see next week when we get beaten by PNG:



... with this tweak - drop Goulding after today and put Hall at 2. Lunt on the bench, again.

The problem with this argument is that Burgess was better in last year’s four Nations than this year after his superstar year in the NRL

I will state again what I have stated many times before - exactly how have Ellis and Burgess improved through the coaching in the NRL?

The week to week intensity of the NRL is higher than Super League, fair enough, but this 'coach them to be better players' is a fallacy

Burgess was poor, no player of his standing should make that many errors.

Tomkins is not a full back.

O'loughlin is not a stand off.

Roby was impressive as was Westwood and I thought Robinson went OK.

Our 3quarters were terrible, but they are very very young and probably shouldn't have been put in that position.

In fact I'm not that down beat about the game, we didn't do too bad. We have a lot of injured players which people seem to be forgetting, I think add Shenton, Mcguire, Sinfield, Morley, Peacock and Eastmond to that side tonight and we could have won, Australia were not that good.

That defeat today was NOTHING to do with any indavidual failures it is a sign of the indavidual weakness of RL in the Northern Hemisphere.

That England team today had never played together before.

If this was a club game everyone would have been saying Robinson and O'Loughlin need time to get use dto plkaying together. yet in their FIRST game together everyone is criticising them.

The centres and the wings are all being criticised they have NEVER played together before.

WTF do you all expect.
Many of those players have never played in a game of that intensity before.

Australia play 7 meaningful International games a year ( inlc the 3 SOO games).

England play France before getting hammered by Aus and NZ.

The RL needs to address this by bringing sopme quality competitive games into the season. To hone players skills and to get them playing at a high intensity. that is what weeds out indavidual mistakes.

We have 3 years to get it right or we lose the opportunity of having the World cup.

can someone in England please watch some NRL videos and teach our backline how to deal with players attacking wide! Geez time after time for 3 years now we've looked liked rabbits in the headlights whenever Lockyer/Marshall ran wide and passed to the centre after the 2nd row ran an inside line. Its not that hard to get a sliding defence!

For the WC:
1. Tomkins - nope doesn't look a good FB at this level. Out of positions for kicks and never chimed into the line as a second attacking stand off. Widdop may be the answer IF he gets a NRL starting gig
2. Goulding - Nope. Defensive liability and little to help out the forwards
3. Shenton- yep. Decent frame, decent pace, just needs to read defence better
4. We need another centre
5. Briscoe - maybe, bad mistake today but not had a bad series in a poor backline
6. Presumably Eastwood will fill this spot?
7. Robinson - Get him to a decent club and give him some more chances
8. Graham - yep I like him alot
9. Roby - yep, Needs to dominate more but plenty of skill
10. Crabtree - can play a Petro battering ram role well
11. Burgess - yep he is only going to get better (maybe Westwood and O'Loughlin to 13)
12. Ellis - yep for now but need to be finding a replacement for 2013
13. Westwood - I like the look of this kid, needs to get in the gym but has all the skills and ticker

problem lies in depth. If we lose the starting player then we are stuffed.

I can see how playing in the NRL has worked wonders for Ellis and Burgess. They look so invincible now, never making a mistake and tearing the opposition apart. NOT!!!!

Westwood is world class by playing in SL same for Graham. Only difference with playing in the NRL, is that those players wold receive the recognistion they deserver from fans who faun over everything Australian, while ignoring quality that is present in the UK.

no they would be exposed to high intensity games week in and week out and modern coaching with high quality back room staff. People talk about Ellis, watch him and how he plays for Wests. Running wide, back on angles to feed off Marshall etc. What the heck was Englands game plan for him? I watched wondering why they were using him as a 3rd prop to batter it up the middle!

Cameron Smith only made 2 runs for 18 metres in the game today, is he a poor hooker?

Bravo

Tomkins - Poor, and definitely capable of better but they did a good job on him.
Goulding - There's nothing in his game to worry the best Test teams, decent finisher but that's about it. We need more physicality from the back three on our kick returns and early tackles and for that reason I would always pick Hall over him.
Cudjoe - Barely played enough at centre in SL to warrant being picked in that position and it showed. A talented player though and we need to be patient with him.
Atkins - He's a far better player than he's shown on this tour, but some of the mistakes he made should have been coached out of him years ago. Definitely more of a winger than centre for me, and one of the very few backs that would provide the physicality I mentioned earlier.
Briscoe - Similar to Goulding in many respects, but from what little I've seen of him he looks to have more to his game than Goulding.
O'Loughlin - To say I barely noticed him is probably the biggest complement I can give him. Not at fault for the way the team performed in any way, but a ridiculous decision by McNamara to play him at 6.
Robinson - Massive effort from him, and he played reasonably well. I wanted him to attack the line more as he got their big blokes on the back foot a lot when he went at them.
Burgess - If he didn't make so many errors I would say he was one of our best. Some impressive carries and defensive work but put us under a lot of unnecessary pressure.
Roby - Another competent display, also made an error but he's comfortable at this level and the England team should be built around him.
Graham - Worked hard, he can play much longer though and I would rather him have got more time at the expense of the two props on the bench who did nothing.
Ellis - Solid and got through his work efficiently.
Tomkins - Another who's capable of more, not that he did anything wrong but he can carry the ball better than he did. One for the longer-term.
Westwood - Really impressive at the start of the game, and non-stop effort whenever he was on the field. A bit of a silly penalty to give away early doors but he can feel hard done by considering all the lying-on the referee allowed later in the game.
Fielden - Poor, was worth another try after his good club form this season but surely that's the last we'll see of him at this level.
Crabtree - disappointing from the big man I thought, we need more from him if he's to keep his place in future.
Harrison - Looked really slow, I didn't think he was up to it at this level anyway and today did nothing to change my mind.
Lunt - Need another look at him really, throwing him into a dead game in poor conditions does him no favours. A few nice touches though.

Ellis running wide on good angles - he never did that for Wakefield or Leeds did he?

I cannot see a single facet of their game that the 'modern coaching with high quality back room staff' have added to Burgess or Ellis

The long term health of the English national team is dependent in the strength of the game in the UK not sending three or four players to Australia each generation

You still dont get it do you. The only time a hooker should be scooting from Dummy half is when his forwards have got the roll on and there has been a quick play the ball, leaving the defensive line at sixes and sevens. This never happened today.

If you actually read what I put instead of shooting your troll mouth off, you'd notice what I'd put. I.e that it wasn't the lack of running, more the lack of creativity and direction. Bar the admitedly excellent pass to Burgess he did nothing bar drop it onto the next forward. Far too predictable at this level.

Again the whole team underperformed from what we all know they can produce, the problem isnt with the players picked, the team on the park COULD have beaten Aus, but needed the right preparation, build up and most importantly coaching.

Poor strategising and man magement seem to be the hallmark of MacNamara at Bradford and now England

Lack of understanding between key players meaning passes go to ground for whatever reason, or one defender moves up as the other waits, leaving gaps = we MUST play more than one or two internationals a season.

Just to point out, but the try people are blaming Cudjoe for is actually down to O'Loughlin, Cudjoe and his winger did perfectly, moving up quickly to meet the attack and stop the move dead.

O'Loughlin stood and watched as the Aussie line attacked and it was the gap he left they scored through.

The players on the park COULD NOT beat Australia in a game that matters. We have only ever beaten them in dead rubbers or games where they are confident of prevailing overall.

We cannot defend properly. That is not something a coach can fix, it's in the players themselves. If you look at what Sheens said about Ellis, that they had to spend months rewiring his entire defensive effort because he was so naive. Now Ellis is supposed to be one of our best players. It would take Sheens a decade to sort out Ryan Atkins' defensive problems.

Why does everyone keep saying we under performed? That players are a lot better than what they showed today?
Are they really any better? Or are the Aussies & NZ actually that much better than us. We can't keep saying players underperformed year in year and and justify archaic coaching techniques based on 1 game every 4 years we pull out of the bag. Michael Maguire went to Wigan this year and brought a new approach to coaching and took the same players and made them champions. This is what we need to do throughout Rugby League. A new modern approach to the game has to be brought in. The Mcnamaras, Mcdermotts and Lowes of this game need to be replaced. The brass at HQ need to be shipped out and the game needs to be looked at properly by people who want to bring the game forward.

Putting all our best players into the NRL is not the answer though, it would just weaken Superleague and create a void in the competion to be be filled in 2nd rate overseas players and young english players not ready for the big time.
The answer is to make Superleague more intense week in week out, we did have a spell of it around 2005/2006, then the RFL messed around with how the game should be played and the result is what we have today.