O'Loughlin at 6, Robinson at 7.

I know Robinson used to play scrum half but he's now a hooker at Huddersfield so effectively we've an 8 man pack.

Not sure what to think about it. Is McNamara playing to our strengths (the pack) and going to try and relentlessly smash the Aussies down the middle?

Is it a defensive ploy to stop their big centres by having more size out wide? Has he given up and put a team out to keep the score down?

How are we going to bring Sam Tomkins in to the game with only one pivot for him to feed off?

Wont be pretty Mick but our best chance is to out muscle them down the middle.
We aint got a prayer down the flanks.


Ah well we may just sneak it

To be honest the handicap is 18 points Steve so i'm sticking a few quid on the Australians to cover that.

I think you could give England twice as many points lead and they would struggle to keep it.

I think the best way to stop the aussies is this:

1. Tackle around the legs, how many times do players need to be told, "you can't run without legs". Our players always insist on either going high, or shoulder charging the opposition, it doesn't work, if you tackle the legs, wrap the arms of the opposition, and then a 3rd comes in just to knock him down, then that is a good tackle. Just remember Dan Belcher at home to toulouse, He tried the shoulder charge, and ended up on his , with the Toulouse player scoring a try.

2. Take referee out of the equation. Get onside, or atleast make the effort, stop the backchat, stop trying to rip the ball out, cause as soon as they put their hand on the ball they are going in with the intent to rip the ball out, if a player is tackled right then he can't pass anyway.

3. I know there are a lot of big names out of the team, which everyone is used to seeing, but if this team can stick together, and learn to work together then we could win the world cup in 2013, but they need to gel as a team.

I know This is going to get some stick, like what makes you so sure? or let's see you coach the team better, I am not saying i can do that, but these are things to be looked at.

All good points.

I'd also add.

Don't kick to Slater. Either kick the ball dead for a 20 tap or stick it in to touch.

Disrupt their rhythm, the games when we've done really well against them usually have involved a bit of biff.

Nail their scrum half early. Nearly every time we lose to the Australians the scrum half gets man of the match. See if we can get Burgess to put a big hit on him and will he want to know?

Innovate, for donkey's years we've been trying to copy the Australians let's show them something they've never seen before, a different look, trick plays, maybe stick one of those many forwards we've got out wide and tire their strike players out by making them defend a lot.

Oh and one last thing,







PLAY WITH NEUTRAL REFS FFS!!!

The VR decision with the clear knock-on where he gave benefit of a doubt. Compounded by Lunt's disallowed effort when he sent it back to the referee, why wasn't that benefit of the doubt?

A forward pass for Tuquiri's (I think) try that Peyton Manning would have been proud of. Yet he blows for a forward pass when Cudjoe was sent through when at the very most it was flat.

We lost the game by 20 points but to be honest with fair officials it should have been 3 tries closer than that.

That said we weren't great, dropped too much ball in key areas, edge defence again was rubbish.. Suprisingly though we didn't give up many line breaks and at times our pack looked dominent and put some huge hits in. Kicking game was a little better but still rubbish.

Having a different ref, would have made no difference to the final outcome.

We are not good enough.

We probably would still have lost the game, but for the sake of the game worldwide we at least deserve to be given a fair shot at it.

In no way was that fair refereeing this morning it was embarrassing for the sport.

What would have been wrong with Thierry Allibert taking charge?

There is no probably about it. it wont matter who the ref is. We are just not good enough.

Like someone said above, I paraphrase, let us play on a level paying field, may be we will still lose but at least there would be no excuses... I think the RFL need to get off of their chicken livered backsides and get that particular chestnut sorted.... Hoewever, read this I persoanlly think this is someone talking who has a modicum of sense... news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_l ... 143446.stm

Like someone said above, I paraphrase, let us play on a level paying field, may be we will still lose but at least there would be no excuses... I think the RFL need to get off of their chicken livered backsides and get that particular chestnut sorted.... Hoewever, read this I persoanlly think this is someone talking who has a modicum of sense... news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_l ... 143446.stm

Quote ="forwardpass1"Like someone said above, I paraphrase, let us play on a level paying field, may be we will still lose but at least there would be no excuses... I think the RFL need to get off of their chicken livered backsides and get that particular chestnut sorted.... Hoewever, read this I persoanlly think this is someone talking who has a modicum of sense... news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_l ... 143446.stm'" Dave Woods speaks a huge amount of sense there. I just wish that the RFL would listen to people like him instead looking in on themselves all the time.

Quote ="forwardpass1"Like someone said above, I paraphrase, let us play on a level paying field, may be we will still lose but at least there would be no excuses... I think the RFL need to get off of their chicken livered backsides and get that particular chestnut sorted.... Hoewever, read this I persoanlly think this is someone talking who has a modicum of sense... news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_l ... 143446.stm'" Dave Woods speaks a huge amount of sense there. I just wish that the RFL would listen to people like him instead looking in on themselves all the time.

I thought that we played better in the second half. But we're are still not good enough.
It does not matter what side we put out, the Aussies will always beat us.
The american football game from Wembley was far better.
The next game is against P.N.G. and this will not be a easy game for England.

I've always said that there are far too-many 'imports'.

No matter what anyone says, the RFL still bow to Sky and touch their forelocks in obedience.

There should be no 'residency term-qualification' for any player. Forget how many have grandmothers/granfathers who used to live in England/Wales/Scotland. Individual players must have been born in the country for which they wish to play. That should be the only qualification.

How many Australian clubs have non-Australian players in their teams, let alone their National team (forget about the Pacific Islands).

It's the same in any England squad - especially cricket.

We need to develop our own talent and forget about 'multi-culturalism' wherever and whenevr it raises its ugly head; otherwise we're doomed. Let anyone who isn't GB born and bred (also English) play for their own country and see if they can break into their Test squad - no matter what sport.

I'm all for Imports, so long as they're top quality.

It's the mediocre ones the that shouldn't be over here.

Due to EU employment law we can't stop the ones with EU passports from coming over.

There should also be financial incentives for the Semi Pro and Amateur clubs to produce young talent. What's the point of them investing precious time and money on developing players if the cream of the crop go to Super League for free?