Who should be the England spine for the upcoming World Cup, if it goes ahead? All thoughts and/or predictions and/or guesses and/or "would-like-to-see"s welcome.

1st Hooker
2nd Hooker

Half-back 1
Half-back 2

Fullback

Some possibles to get the juices flowing:

1st Hooker: Roby
2nd Hooker: Not Hodgson for mine. Nor Clark he unless plays very well this year. Happy to try one of the workhorses as 2nd fiddle e.g. McShane or Houghton.

Half-back 1: Luke Gale
Half-back 2: George Williams

Fullback: IMO Jake Connor needs to be on the pitch somewhere and happy for it to be here or centre. I guess Wane'll probably go with either Lomax or Tomkins.

Hodgson, Clark, Williams, Widdop and Connor.

I think Connor at Full Back for Hull this year (with Hodgson as coach) will be a revelation

1-Tomkins
6-Lomax
7-Gale
9-Roby
17-Williams

Tough call for me between Lomax, Gale and Williams to start in the halves but Gale brings a kicking game and is a goal kicker and I fear Lomax/Williams would be a bit too similar. George Williams can more than hold his own in at dummy half when needed and he can cover the halves. If not him on the bench then Daryl Clark.

Jake Connor is the Jesse Lingard of Rugby League

Half decent, annoying and in 10 years time people will still be claiming "hes gonna be a top player in a few years"

crikey I'm agreeing with you I better sit down

He certainly has the ability but, I agree that he doesnt hit a 9/10 performance often enough.
Mind you, our spine wont scare anyone.

Tomkins is the only X factor player in there but, Daz Clark has to play either at 9 or be coming off the bench.
Even though he's getting to the end of his career, Roby, if he is still going strong at the end of the season will be nailed on.

Houghton is good but also getting on a bit and Hodgson has never offered the flair thet either Roby or Clark can offer.

Our halves, whoever we pick wont scare anyone. In fact our backs look ordinary.

We have relied on having a quality pack for the last few years but, even our forwards are looking weaker than they were at the last world cup.

It has to be said that under Bennett we have gone backwards, a poor side and no new blood to reinvigorate the side.

A semi final exit is the best that we can hope for.

Agree totally. Our backs are miles away from the class of Australia and NZ

Connor is an x-factor player. I remember a match vs NZ where they really seemed to struggle with him. NZ have several x-factor players, and we have very few. And Aus are always going to do the boring/"make no mistakes" stuff better than us so we need to have some creativity come from somewhere. In general with recent Eng/GB performances, we did the arm wrestle well enough but could do with a little more in terms of creativity.

1. S Tomkins
6. J Lomax Or maybe Hastings dependent on this season's form.
7. G Williams
9. Roby / Clarke - Interchange

Hodgson and Clark didn't do it for me at international level. Their games are both too reliant on oppositions' defences being in disarray, but that doesn't happen with Aus/NZ. To beat Aus/NZ you either need true creatives at 9 who can threaten even very good defences, or the other type of hooker who will deliver consistent ball to the backs and whack in defence.

I was dissatisfied by Hodgson and Clark at international level and didn't think they were what we needed, so I threw in a couple of alternatives to generate discussion. Feel free to make your case for Clark or Hodgson, or A.N.Other if you so wish!