Good point. I would have thought everyone was like that though. I can't understand that someone would put club level ahead of beating Aussies.

I prefer club footie to international footie. Especially after today ( I felt like I'd been kicked and then punched in the knackers watching those decisions)

But beating the Aussies is always top priority. I wouldn't care if it was shuffle-board I'd still be rooting for us to beat the Aussies.

I can easily admit that Atkins was awful but so were both Tomkins and o'loughlin and briscoe.

Westwood was great and so was Roby (who was better) and Graham.

These are Englishmen and almost our brethren. We should hold them all the same.

I know Graham is erratic but i have a new found respect for him for not beating smith (i think) senseless after that (not-a) play of the ball before they went for the 2.

I was wishing Graham had raced in and tackled Smith which would probably have sparked off a brawl during which someone might have accidentally thumped the ref!

Certainly the Ozzies had the knock-on try and the forward pass try given which were shocking decisions.
The English lads obviously wondered what they had to do to play fairly.
But I thought the Ozzies started chucking it about once they were three scores ahead, and lost a lot of their discipline. Their completion rates in the first and second halves (stanzas) were so different, and it wasn't down to the English playing any better.

If it was the other way round and Richard Silverwood had reffed that match but we got all the decisions there would be absolute uproar from the Aussies but we just bend over and take it. He should never be allowed to ref England V Australia or Australia v anyone again.

I couldnt even begin to discribe how frustrating last nights game was to watch live in the ground. The KEY decisions ALL went the Aussies way, even the Aussies around me were throughly embarrassed by the ref's performance to the extent some of them left the ground early in disgust. They seems genuinly gutted that potentially a cracking game was spoiled/ruined by the clowns officiating.
Even so when you look at our team which was lacking so many first teamers and then look at the Aussies who had an abundance of riches do not be too downhearted, as if the the obvious bias hadnt been there we deffo would have been within a sniff.

It was quite bizarre to read the papers this morning to see Sheens whinging about the ref and how the ruck was too slow!!!! Has there been any mention of the refs performance from players, coaches or officials from ther RFL? theres needs to be as if the boot had been on the other foot, well you could imagine!!

Oh and Mr James Graham earned alot of respect back from me last night as he went to all 4 stands after the game to thank the England fans, great effort!!

If theres any concellation, of the approx 1K England fans there last neet, the majority were Wiganers.

Oh and come on Tommy show them how its done next week.

I think the nub of this is not who played well and who didn't but the fact that every other team sport at international level has neutral referrees.

We pride ourselves on bringing new technology to the forefront in this great game of ours and yet we can't even get the basics correct.

Accusations of bias can be removed by appointing neutral match officials.

In addition I find it quite disappointing that the current super league and NRL rules for what is the same game are different. Interpretation is also different.

Neutral referees, play the same rules and officiate the same interpretation throughout the game of rugby leagure and then there can be no excuses and no arguments.

Playing the same rules and same interpretation would help us considerably when we get to internationals if we have been doing the same all season. It becomes second nature for the players them.

Until this is solved the international game will quite rightly be the laughing stock and not get the recognition it deserves. It should also benefit the European nations by making them more competitive in the long run which is good for the international game.

Ian

Agree totally about the necessity of having neutral referees. They brought them in for cricket about 10 years ago to dispel any accusations of bias after there had been several/numerous injustices perpetrated by umpires favouring their home country. Mistakes are still made, but these are through ineptitude rather than bias and are thus much more likely to even themselves out in the course of a match/series.

It would thus have been better to have Alibert (or a NZ official) refereeing, even though we know he is rather inept and prone to making mistakes. At least these would probably have evened themselves out - unlike the game on Sunday where the Aussies were without exception the beneficiaries of all the mistakes ( forward passes) and blatant knock ons ( 2nd try) as well as any 50/50 VR decisions ( Aussie "tries" allowed, English "tries" disallowed).

Cheating? Give over.

We were outclassed.