And then he drops him.

Don't understand any of the logic used there.

Reminds the player that the coach still rates him, even though he sees better options available for the next game.

Dropping McGuire and Smith takes some of the heat off the coach too by responding to public opinion.

True, but why tell a story about "having a bad day at the office" and then effectively drop him for the rest of the tournament (injuries not withstanding)? He was Smith's first choice 6 or he wasn't. If he wasn't then he shouldn't have played against Australia. What does Smith need to know about McGuire that he doesn't already know from coaching him for 4 years? He's played against Australia before and NZ before, so if he's going to drop him after "one bad day", why pick him at all?
You also have to give the halves more than one game together. It would be the last positions I would mess around with. Logically you would also have to ask why Smith's previous first choice 7 hasn't had a look in so far.

For me Smith's exclusion makes more sense.

Just realised Smith has also left Peacock in the second row. Now if we are talking about correcting mistakes....

I agree with all of that. Thats why I was annoyed with his selection of Myler for the France game. We should have started as we meant to go on with our first choice half backs from the beginning to the end of the tournament. Its only 3 games or 4 at most. This tournament ws not the place to be going swapping players around, especially at half back. Smith has had all season plus the England training sessions to decide on his half backs. Pick them then stick with them, whoever they might be.

It's not one bad game though, is it?

McGuire - like a lot of the players who were at the World Cup IMO - went into this competition in the last chance saloon.

He hardly set the world on fire against the French and had a mare against the Aussies. Two games in, two ordinary (and that's being generous) performances was hardly going to be enough to retain his place with the likes of Tomkins and Eastmond snapping at his heels.

This was my post on the Saints site.

"Probably the right team, but I'm not sure about Peacock in the second row.

McGuire, Smith and Tom Briscoe came in for a lot of (mainly justified) criticism after Saturdays defeat, but they were not helped by having Peacock in the second row, who IMO is not quick enough for that position particularly in defense.

I would have had Westwood in the second row, Peacock starting and Morley on the bench."

Many thought he was the only functional half back we had at the WC, and one of the better performers from the squad. If you apply those criteria above then Peacock, Morley, Wilkin, Roby should all be dropped as well.

Why was Myler dropped after the French game? He played pretty well.

3 games, 3 different half back combinations - no injuries.

That's your opinion. I thought - two close range tries, one of which was laid on a plate by Sinfield apart - he was pretty poor against the French as were most of the side.

It might be an opinion, but he did very little wrong. He took his chances - the first try took some scoring - and defended well. And I agree, most of the side were pretty poor, so why single out your previous first choice 7 for the axe? Especially as we won the game fairly comfortably in the end.

3 different half back combinations in 3 games doesn't make a lot of sense to me unless someone is injured.

SCAPEGOAT springs to mind

So was Leon Pryce made the scapegoat for England's World Cup campaign?

You have to reward players for performing, McGuire did not perform and is gone and rightly so. Tomkins and Eastmond have looked our far most dangerous halves, they were excellent against Australia, both came of age while McGuire showed it.

These 2 youngsters show no fear or respent for the opposition, they do not bottle it, sadly when faced with a major challenge at the top level McGire has shown little confidence and it has shown in his performance. Correct decision and hopefully he will not be seen representing his country again.

Would have preferred Morley on the bench, Peacock prop and burgess start in 2nd row.

I imagine that Peacock will be moevd to prop sortly though with 3 second rows on the bench

Tompkins was barely adequate against Australia - a non-existant first half does not in any way convert to "excellent". Sinfield was the stand out half back performer. Eastmond played most of the game at centre - and he did show up very well. It would have been interesting to see the threads created had Tompkins defended on the right side of the English line on Saturday. He might have found it difficult to stop Inglis or Slater in space by grabbing their collars (which appears to be his preferred tackling technique).

Not just his though, G1 (no less) was there and spoke highly of his contribution after the match.

I also thought he would stick with the same half back pairings for the tournament as the best option going forward. Swapping and changing the critical positions rarely works in my opinion.