To be fair Briscoe did alright. He was solid in defense, his problem is he won't give you enough in attack other than support play. That's just the player he is and why he is a good pro where Slater is world class.

Tomkins and Eastmond need time and experience and this is the only way they will get it. They have both only broken through this season and have very little first team rugby. Compare that to Thurston and Lockyer the latter having played 50 tests. It was always going to be a big ask.

I have nothing against anyone who played tonight, all gave 100% and for nearly 60 mins i thought we had a chance which was far better than i expected before kick off. What we desperatly need though is some top quality outside backs.

What? Were we watching the same game? His centres didn't have any faith in him whatsoever, that's why we conceded a couple of tried down the right towards the end of the game.

What we need is a coach who is willing to stick his neck out and not just pick the same old tried and tested players who've failed before. It's not as though they could get any worse?

Eastmonds has a tendency to disappear for long stretches of a game.

Because i CBA to go through the match thread, i will say that it was physical fitness that was the difference tonight. That's all.

Should the tournament be played in a 2 week break mid-season? A chance to see all players in all teams at the peak of their season fitness, not at the end of a 9 month slog surely would make for a more even, entertaining spectacle.

Was your post a joke?

Same old tried and tested players like Eastmond and Shenton do you mean?

Me thinks you listen to Stevo and Eddie raving about some player on Sky, saying how they should play for England just for doing one skillfull moment.

We were well in the game until Shenton got injured. His deserves his position and never let us down.



What? At 20? IIRC Edwards wasn't hitting the heights in a half back position at aged 20 and Gregory had done jack at international level at the same age. I'm pretty sure that Gregory was in one of the sides that was flogged by 'The Invincibles' when he was the same age. In fact both had done jack at international level at the same age as either Eastmond or Tomkins. I've just checked and Edwards played his first game, off the bench, against Australia aged 20 and didn't face them again until 1992 when he was 26. Gregory's record against Australia was 2 wins and 8 losses. Hardly heroic.

thank you you saved me the trouble.

You really don't know what your talking about do you ?

Edwards started from playing at Wembley in 1985. He was 16 !

If you think that that was the only difference then you need to get your medication changed.

The passing at speed and accuracy, the support play, the kicking game, that speed of thought and action, the skill level , the depth of the sqauad were all far more important.

England have some great players, have some potentially grat players BUT the Aussies are still years ahead of us.

The biggest difference is number of quality players. GB have 5 or 6 very good players, and the Aussies have around 25 so you rarely notice the difference when they have to drop a new face into the team.

We stuck with them for around an hour, which is no mean feat, but couldn't match them after that because our better players were exhausted and that really exposed our poorer players.

We can close the gap, and people like Ellis and Burgess being in the NRL will help, but we must generate more quality in numbers. Club teams playing rafts of average overseas players simply doesn't help and they effectively penalise the England team as a result.

I suggest you read the posts again before making posts like that

What's that got to do with what we're talking about?

No he didn't.
Edwards played at Wembley v Widnes in 1984 at the age of 17 years and 6 months.

He signed for Wigan on his 17th birthday in October 1983.