You have to laugh. The clearer it becomes that Tomkins is the best player in SL, the only criticism left is that he MIGHT not have scored a certain try IF he'd been playing against the Aussies. How many times do you stop and think after one of your own players has scored a try "Hmm, well I suppose he wouldn't have scored that against the Aussies." How many times have great tries been scored in SL by players other than Tomkins and been met with criticism rather than praise on the basis that they might not have scored the same try against the Aussies? It's bonkers! It really is clutching at straws for want of criticism. I mean think about it, it amounts to "Tomkins is only good because he's playing against us, and we're shίt!"

You are missing the point(s). This is not having a go at Tompkins.
1. Tomkins is a great player most saints fans would be delighted if him or his equivalent (if there was one but I can't think of one in this country who is better than him).
2. The try he scored against us was a very poor try to concede. We had ample opportunity to stop him but LMS, Moore and Wello failed miserably. It took some scoring but he should have been stopped as he signalled exactly what he was going to try to do.
3. Ron's and my view's are that the aussie national team would not defend like that and concede such a relatively "soft" try.

I don't see anything wrong with the opinion that tomkins is a fantastic player but he should have been stopped. I think the difference is that you see it as a great try whilst I saw it as a try that we should never have conceded.

Unlike the the try at the end of the first half which was a superb try by anyone's definition and although I know how frail/lazy Meli can be in defence, I think most players would have had a difficult time countering that step at that pace. Superb try.

Agreed 100%

Ok fair enough, it just seems to be trotted out after every single Tomkins try lately, constantly banging on about "the Aussies" because that's the only "criticism" left.

No thats fine, now then; fancy swapping him for wello?

I'm not qiute sure how this thread turned into a Tomkins debate but i'll join in anyway.

I doubt he would of scored that try against Australia because they wouldn't have given him the opportunity. He took advantage of a gap he spotted. There is no doubting his ability but when (assuming he is fit) plays in the 4 nations i don't think he'll cause too many problems for Australia. This is not because i don't think he is not good enough but because i don't think England are good enough. As a team we don't run the lines and offer the space for any of our attacking players to take advantage.

Until the standard of coaching throughout SL improves i don't think England will, whoever the coach is.

GB/England for years have looked clueless as an attacking unit, particularly out wide. You literally could put Bill Slater at his peak in at full back for us and he wouldn't do much and people would wonder what all the fuss was about. Until we get halfbacks who can set up plays and provide structure (hopefully Widdopp will help here), and some athleticism and attacking threat in the threequarters (signs of a couple of potential players here), Tomkins would look as stranded as everyone else has.

We also need our forwards to do far better work off the ball as well.

Better stop there, the whole topic is thoroughly depressing....

So everyone agrees with me, good stuff.

Plenty of Tomkins threads elsewhere...

Still feel that there was a couple of errors on Saturday that cost us (despite people's personal favouritsm and dislike of Wellens, Wilkin, LMS, Shenton blah, blah, blah); one in that we continued to do the same thing despite good position & ball and one in that we didn't fully rotate our subs.

If the coach believed that we were doing well offensively (with our one move) and it was only a matter of time before we scored, I can understand Gaskell's late introduction. Even so think he would have provided other options to keep Wigan under pressure. Even if Gaskell was brought on for a few minutes to allow Meli into the pack and Pryce at Centre just to rest Wilkin or Flannery or LMS, it would have been worth it. Same with Clough, surely he could have managed a couple of fifteen minute spells which I think would have made all the difference. If he wasn't fit (understand he wouldn't be match fit, I mean over his injury) then we should have had anyone who was.

Already mentioned that Wilkin made fifty tackles but offered limited attack....so would anyone having to play the full game in a tough game against the best team in the league.

Wilkin was our only attack in the first half. His grubber kicks produced at least four goal line dropouts and they could have been tries had the rest of the team been awake. Two of our attacking 'weapons' - Wello and Pryce, made hugely important errors in keeping the ball when they should have passed, especially Wello since the receiver ran over the line anyway. It's like our attack was of the nerves rather than rugby league. Only when we were kicked up the backside by the deficit did we play according to the game plan. And it worked. We scored two tries. Too little too late.

Everyone has conveniently forgotten the DW. Same game plan, different players; more awake and fitter players.