Well, lets be honest, someone was bound to do it sooner or later.........

Sorry, I thought we were talking about the standard of play here and the lack of available talent hence the comparisons, there's over 60 million people in this country most sporting people chose football, the foreigners I allude to come for one thing and it's not the climate, and my point still stands where is the talent available to the premiership clubs in this country, it's like rugby league most people complain that there are two many overseas players over here to have a decent national team, then surely the same applies to football.

It does. I don't disagree about the affect it has on the national team, though I wouldn't get rid altogether.
You also get better playing the best players in the world.

We did it in the 70s and the Aussies pulled away from us.

McIlorum doesn’t play NRL. Zero intensity, zero interest, big error. Watkins and Welsby don’t and weren’t brilliant. I thought Radley did ok and was somehow selected for the dream team but we could have managed without him. Doesn’t matter if it’s one or forty points. We lost, again. Again in the dying minutes because we lost our intensity/ concentration and handed over the win. At least Australia aren’t in the wheelchair final.

There isn’t a more intense hooker that MM that qualifies to play for England.

Ackers for one, he looked interested.Can’t remember a single shunt from dummy half from MM. Body language awful. He won’t play again for England and hopefully not.

Saying we could have managed with Radley negates your argument on every level.

No it bloody well doesn’t. Visit Specsavers and try get some clear lenses.

Apart from 1 pass across all the games, what did he do wrong, and who would have you replaced him with?

Joe Westerman

Ok. He's pretty good but he's 33 and has had some injuries this year. He would have been targeted straight away.
I certainly don't see him as better than Radley, and he certainly doesn't have this NRL intensity so I don't agree.

Think you need to take your own advice - By visiting SpecSavers.....
Joe hasnt been nowhere near as good as he was last season.

That’s a deviation from the point. We lost, again at the death. After Radley’s mistake, we came back to level. Our lack of composure when it mattered, again in a big match, cost us a final spot. Two utterly stupid errors. You could say it saved embarrassment of losing to Australia again but I will be there at OT.
There will probably be quite a few international retirements announced. Hill, Cooper, Hall, Tomkins, Watkins have probably left the saloon. Hopefully, McIlorum too.

This was your point:


And then say we should replace the NRL guy with a 33 year old who's played twice for England (once against a much weaker Samoa 8 years ago and once against combined nations, and played in 2 losing finals so hardly steeped in intense rugby.

England should have won the game, they are the better team but they allowed themselves to be mugged by a Samoan performance built on Englands own complacency.

All week they’ll have been talking the talk, steeling each other against any thought that Samoa would be as bad as they were in game one, making sure that there was no chance they’d take Samoa lightly, it didn’t work!

1% of subconscious complacency is all it takes and you’ll find yourself caught in a battle that not going your way, struggling in a game where an attitudinal switch is needed and you can’t find a way to make it happen.

England were the better team, England should have won the game but they were out enthused by a team motivated by a place in their Nations history and the burning desire to right a wrong from their opening game humiliation but they still needed England to be off their game and England conceded that to them as well.

The were the best team for 20 mins ,Got out played for the other 60 minutes, even the England Coach said they were 2nd best out played and out though and the best team won

I’m not talking about how they performed for 82 minutes, I’m talking about them being the better team in general and why I think they got turned over.

I'm still gutted about it.

Can`t explain why but it didn`t really effect me at all. I don`t think I've ever felt as disconnected to RL outside of Wakefield Trinity as I have at present, it`s almost as if I was watching that game as a neutral.

Felt like that for some time now tbh, if it weren't for watching us I'd wouldn't bother at all.

To be honest I've got little faith in most England teams of any sport, we have a good way of crashing and burning even as favorites

Apart from the Cricket T20 World Cup Winners..............


Obviously.

Cricket isn't really a sport though is it.

That would explain why we won it.....

Exactly
I will watch the wheelchair final to try to be proved wrong