It could get worse, Tomkins could play, aggravate his injury and miss the start of the season !!!

One of his favourite cliches !

I think the idea is to develop other nations & RL, as opposed to just England.

And I'm sure it did exactly that.

It was painful viewing. Your failsafe plan for developing the game is?

im not sure what the rfl expect? there isnt a top level successful welsh, scottish or irish club team so how do you expect the national side to do any different?

the only hope of these sides performing well against england is by flooding their side with aussies or old heads who dont want to be/wont be selected for england anymore - and this doesnt sit right with the idea of developing the game.

short sighted as it is, i dont care about this tournament, but i will care when we play the kiwis and aussies - and i dont see how this is helping us.

on another note, the financial state of our game lends me to think expanding the game isnt the best idea...

Documented in other threads.

Surly doing a Lancs vs Yorke series would be much better! Not offence to the other 2 nations, but the standard is nowhere near that of ours! Or even make the series into 4 teams with Lancs, Yorkshire, Wales/rest of England and then France!

Anyone?

Lancashire / Yorkshire games happened on a fairly regular basis in the past.. I remember going to a few in the late 60's / early 70's. Usually on a mid-week evening, and when on the proper side of the pennines, invariably at Central Park, as the only ground with decent floodlights



Then, the games were poorly attended, and 2nd string players the norm, as the 'stars' of the time often stepped down for one reason or another. (I'll leave that open

)

It flopped then and I (sadly) see no reason as to why it wouldn't flop again.

As a young lad of 19 years, i think i went to one game and cant remember it at all!

Your saying that it flopped, but it cant be as bad as that garbage the bbc showed us on saturday!?

Either that or just change it back to bloody GB! With all the Team GB hype from the olympics, you think the RFL would of cashed in on it, i know it isnt an olympic sport but it has soo much more appeal that the 4 nations do!

Because its the RFL and they're idiots.

I can't say I have the answers and logistics would be a problem but as a relatively new close follower of RL I think the answer lies in playing Antipodean opposition more regularly - in RU England and Australia sometimes play each other twice a year home and away. Even if it's not the full Australian team a contest like Eng v Queensland or NSW would be something you would really want to go to and a real test for the team. I know that this would involve much closer linking with the NRL but it really is needed IMO. It also seems a pity that the NRL champions come halfway round the world to play a single match in February, while a month or two later we are left wishing there was some meaningful opposition around for an England international.

Maybe have England v Super league dream team 2012????????

Just replace the players who feature in both with some of the Exiles players?

I might be getting confused here but then wouldn't that just be England vs the Exiles still? (apologies if it was a gag)

Tomkins- Replaced by an exiles player
Charnley- Replaced by an exiles player
Atkins- Replaced by an exiles player
Carmont- Gone home and will be replaced by an exiles player
Ryan Hall- Replaced by an exiles player
Brett Finch- Gone home and will be replaced by an exiles player
Scott Dureau- An exiles player already
Chris Hill- Replaced by an exiles player
James Roby- Replaced by an exiles player
Remi Casty- We've found one, this lad isn't as exile and could play as a 'dream team' member
Ben Westwood- Replaced by an exiles player
Gareth Hock- Replaced by an exiles player
Sean O'Loughlin- Replaced by an exiles player

So overall it's either going to have to be England vs the Exiles + Remi Casty or England vs Remi Casty on his tod.....he would probably be more of a challenge then Wales though.

The old school ties at the Beeb and the RFU must be laughing into their champers. Could Rugby League be run any worse? I think not.

Team for today Josh Charnley Super League's leading try scorer and on his internal debut last week scored 4 tries is dropped for Tom Briscoe, Could it get any worse?


Sam Tomkins (Wigan)
Ryan Hall (Leeds)
Kallum Watkins (Leeds)
Leroy Cudjoe (Huddersfield)
Tom Briscoe (Hull FC)
Kevin Sinfield (Leeds)
Richie Myler (Warrington)
Lee Mossop (Wigan)
Micky McIlorum (Wigan)
Chris Hill (Warrington)
Gareth Hock (Wigan)
Gareth Ellis (West Tigers/Hull FC)
Jamie Jones-Buchanan (Leeds)

Subs:

Rob Burrow (Leeds)
Adrian Morley (Warrington)
Carl Ablett (Leeds)
Ben Harrison (Warrington)

hopefully that suggests that hall and briscoe are playing for the remaining wing position in the final, therefore a positive move for josh.

i'm more worried by the fact that myler has another outing in the halves.
a truly dreadful international prospect if we are looking at having him in the line-up against the big boys.

Myler was very poor last week he's an average super league player and a bellow par international player, I'd prefer Gaskell or Lomax to Myler.

agree entirely. he's that bad, i'd even add chase to that list !
he is a luxury player who only looks good in a team that is dominant.

Not really impressed so far with the England / France game.

All it's really telling me is that we're more than likely going to end up with a New Zealand / Australia World Cup Final as we're way behind those two.

If the best we can do for half back is Myler then we're in real trouble when we have to step up to the likes of the Kiwis and Aussies.

to be fair, this is not the full Eng lineup. We have at least 2 halves missing (chase, widdop), and the opportunity next season for a few of the more talented juniors to push themselves into the frame eg gaskell, lomax, as well as the option of using Sam.
Add to that the other Aussie based players that are not here, and next years Eng side will be a lot stronger.

We also now have strength in depth in the 3/4s for the first time in 20 years.

IF we can solve the problems at 6 and 7, we WILL be a real threat

We beat NZ fairly comfortably last year, I don't think we are too far behind them. Add Sam burgess, graham, widdop, Westwood, Roby lockers etc to this squad. I agree 7 is definitely the problem position. Myler needs to improve massively. As do the other options. I'd probably be leaning towards a sinfield and widdop hb pairing for next year, though I still don't like sinfield at 6 in the big games, I'd much rather widdop at six alongside a genuine quality scrum half, but I don't think we have one!

I'd go with a Widdop/Chase half back pairing, for me Sinfield is no more than a utility player at international level.

I think Lockers would go before him at LF, Widdop before him at SO, Roby before him at Hooker. He's really unlucky but I think there are better players than him for specific positions. Although there's no doubt he's very handy to have in the squad to cover for any injuries.

Quote ="Bergen Bulldog"Not really impressed so far with the England / France game. All it's really telling me is that we're more than likely going to end up with a New Zealand / Australia World Cup Final as we're way behind those two. If the best we can do for half back is Myler then we're in real trouble when we have to step up to the likes of the Kiwis and Aussies.'" I must have been watching a different game. www.warringtonguardian.co.uk/spo ... s/?ref=rss

Quote ="Bergen Bulldog"Not really impressed so far with the England / France game. All it's really telling me is that we're more than likely going to end up with a New Zealand / Australia World Cup Final as we're way behind those two. If the best we can do for half back is Myler then we're in real trouble when we have to step up to the likes of the Kiwis and Aussies.'" I must have been watching a different game. www.warringtonguardian.co.uk/spo ... s/?ref=rss

Who would be in your current England squad for next years World Cup. For me currently it would be:

FB S.Tomkins, Z.Hardaker
WNG J.Charnley, R.Hall, T.Briscoe, L.Cudjoe
CTR R.Atkins, K.Watkins, J.Reed, D.Goulding
SO G.Widdop, S.Ratchford
SH R.Chase, R.Burrow
PRP S.Burgess, J.Graham, A.Morley, C.Hill
2R G.Hock, G.Ellis, B.Westwood, B.Harrison
LF S.O'Loughlin, K.Sinfield