Opta have him at 38 along with Roby and Burgess. Opta also have Bronson Harrison with 39 tackles.

Apart from that your post was spot on.

It's a good job O'Loughlin did a lot of defending.

Otherwise his only notable contribution to the game would have been butchering England's one decent break of the first half by not spotting an unmarked Luke Robinson on his inside...

He definitely looked left, but chose to ignore him. Maybe he knew he wouldn't have the pace to finish it off, as shown in the second half

Yes I thought he saw Robinson (and the cover closing in) and thought better of it.

O'Loughlin also threw a nice long ball to the left straight after (I think) where England were unlucky not to receive another set of six ...... perhaps.

Personally think both are overrated, neither do much more (if at all) than Senior does.

Widdop is the new Steadman

At least Widdop has potential. As ever a few myths will be blown apart this series - most notably James Graham as the bestest best prop ever in the universe. Fnarr.

The sad thing is that that's exactly how he appears over here.
When we were being walloped in the 80s & 90s it was because we were still largely part-time.
Since 97 that is no longer the case, yet 13 years later we still seem to be miles behind in terms of conditioning & general strength.
Wigan players who seemed dominant physically over here due to McGuire's conditioning regime did not look like that against the Kiwis. Compare Joel Tompkins efforts over here with how he fared against them.
Heaven help us against the Aussies. My fear is they will dominate us physically & then overpower us later when we've run completely out of Juice.

I don't get the fuss over Graham at club level, never mind in the elevated atmosphere of international level.

He works hard, he puts lots of minutes in and is always willing to cart the ball up.

That isn't enough, you need to have something else about your game to make a success of it at the highest level and Graham doesn't.

I've said it before, and I will say it again. I have been watching the game for over 32 years now, and seen quite a lot of good props, but Graham is very fast becoming the best prop all round prop I have seen in the game.

He has far more to his game than the traditional prop. Whether he is right for team A, B, or C is whatever game plan that coach wants to play. But there is no doubt, if he wasn't English, that he would still walk into that Aussie team also.

Spell it out for me in that case without just quoting stats, because I'm clearly missing it.

To me, props (particularly in the modern game of four man benches and 12 interchanges) are about making an impact on the oppositon, either with ball in hand or through punishing defence.

I'd prefer to see quality of work from my props rather than just volume, and IMO Graham offers a ton of the latter but not as much of the former.

He's not as effective an offloader as Crabtree or Lynch. He's not as punishing a defender as Morley. He doesn't have the pace and athleticism of Burgess.

He reminds me a lot of Steven Price in his last year when his legs had gone. Tons of graft up and down the field, but missing that extra something.

Well I just happen to see a different Graham to you. He is more athletic than the majority of centres, with more pace to go with it. He has the heart of a lion, and the defence to go with it. His passiing game would be in the top 3 props I have ever seen, with some of his passing surpassing half backs.

He is nothing like Steven Price at the end of his career, who was a very good player, he is miles better than Steven Price at the top of his game. Price was only been noticed as a top prop at the back end of his career.

What I will give you is that he should be used for less time than he currently is, in order to keep him on top of the game.

I agree with some of the above, He does posess a good passing game, with a big engine and heart. I also think that he can run good lines, and does have a handy nack for popping up with tries.

I do not agree he has more pace than the majority of centres and i dont think he has a punishing defence, he does not have the same sort of puniching defence that some props possess that makes you hear it sat in the stands.

hat said i do think he is a good player

James Graham is Saints version of Ryan Bailey.

Supposed to be props but don't play like one.

but a fatter shorter version