It is time to look ahead with a new coach and a new England team captain.
Last Saturday's game was England's best performance for decades. A real one off but we, again, lost.
McNamara has to take responsibility for a very large part of that. He has had four years yet a times in this World Cup England were poor. The Italy game was a very poor result. His squad selection was poor, team selection poor, reults poor, performances in the WC and Exiles game were poor. We have to look for someone better to get better performances and results.
Now the WC is over there are no more Test Matches until next Autumn. We don't need a full time England coach.
Make the job part time and then approach the trophy winning club coaches about taking the England job part time.
Also asking Wayne Bennett to take up a part time consultancy role would help the new man, just as he did with Kearney in the 2008 World Cup.

I think you'll find it was Damien Johnson that was interviewing McNamara after the semi-final. The BBC haven't let Tanya Arnold near him since the Ireland game.

All mcNamara said was,'its not been a difficult at all ,its been a great campaign & we've done things the right way.
HTF some of you can find reasons to throw hissy fits after hearing that statement i'll never know.

That's Kyle Eastmond screwed then !

I think tactically Macnamara got it wrong with insufficient support on the bench which showed towards the end of the game.

Think Mossop should have been on the bench and used especially for those last 15 mins when NZ had a roll on. It was a tired head high tackle by George Burgess.

The discipline issue also seemed to be a concern. Hock kicked out of squad and Graham, arguably the Worlds best prop not playing against Australia.... Had he played and we'd won wouldn't we have faced Fiji in the semi final? Our pack against Aus were outmuscled and Tom Burgess out of his depth... Graham and SB up front it could have been different.

The 'chase' issue poorly handled where Widdop was given little game time before the semi final and when give a chance showed a more direct approach required and a lot better England performance ensued.

Despite all that they were brilliant and deserved to win!

Imagine how good they could have been with a good coach, quality squad management and team selection.

Hold on! He got criticism from some quarters for not sending Graham home! Even Hock was crying about being treated differently. He took the decision to drop Graham for the Australia game but now you're saying if he'd played we might have won and played Fiji instead. Yeah, I could see everyone backing that decision. You may be right and we may have beaten Australia in the opener but there's only one person to blame for James Graham not playing and that's James Graham. He put McNamara in a position where he had no alternative. Whether he stays or goes he's done a decent enough job this time despite being let down by some big daft lads who couldn't keep off the booze for a month!

All the mcnamara nay sayers and people criticising his management with f*ck all knowledge of what happened can suck it


He has dealt with things strongly and that has laid a great platform for years to come, because if he hadn’t been as strong it would have sent out the wrong message, not only to our squad, but the England Knights and the Under-18s. We are striving to be No 1 in the world and if we are going to bridge that gap we have to make sure that the off-field stuff is done just as well as the on-field stuff.

I am sure Steve has got a number of career options now but I hope he stays on as England coach. A lot of people have opinions from outside and question certain things and I get all that, especially some of the selection stuff, but when you are inside and know what is happening you realise what a great job he has done. Everybody inside has 100 per cent respect for him. [/i

dine on excrement moron. You know nothing.

Think he's had one competition and come oh so close to exceeding everyone's expectations it would be mad to get shut of him now.

The players back him, he's found the courage to drop ego players taken media flak that IMO no England coach has had to face in the past. The learning curve he's been through would all be wasted.

I'd give until at least after the next World Cup.

Mediocrity? You are clearly simply a sulking Bulls fan with personal issues re McNamara.

If you don't believe you just witnessed a very physical game between two very high-quality, evenly matched sides, you could always ask SBW - ''I don't think I have felt like that before on a footy field,'' Williams said. ''It was such an intense game. It felt like 12 rounds [in the boxing ring]. As you can see from the bruises on my face and on my body, I am pretty banged up but I will be ready to go next week."

Or ask JWH, who was in tears after the game.

Suggesting that loss was in any way comparable to previous ones we've suffered, against what is rated by many as one of the best NZ sides of all time is frankly ridiculous.

Again, McNamara's record at the Bulls is completely irrelevant to how he has done the job for England. If you don't understand that, then as I say, you're just another sulking Bulls fan. You obviously think your former player Sam Burgess is lying or too scared to say anything but good things about McNamara too.

You're getting a bit OTT here, mate. People are entitled to disagree on this issue without turning to that sort of abuse. There's been decent points made on both sides, mostly.

I was not a Mcnamara fan, I thought it was a mistake him getting the job.

I thought he took the right line discipline wise with the drunken players. (They really let the side down with that amateurishness)

I think he should have dropped Chase after the first 2 games, but I don't know whether Widdop was fit and in the 3rd game chase put together a decent 20 mins once we where on top so I can see why he would pick him for France hoping that his form had turned a corner. But faced with that performance he had to drop him as we would not have done better with him in the side.

Would I keep him??? On balance I would say no.
It's a close call, but he has been 4 years out of the regular coaching game, he has had 4 years to put this squad and this regime together. If there is a decent choice out there then the RFL should take it. If there is not a decent choice or only the offer of part-time then we should stick with Steve.

But the game moves on and so must we. I am not a hater and I think I was wrong with my initial thoughts on him 4 years ago. His time has been a success and he has made massive progress with the team, but if there is someone of quality available we should give them a shot too.

I rather like giving a 4 year turn around. Not too into the 1 or 2 year deals and I feel that is what we would offer steve now. A 1 year deal to see if he can pulling it off next year in the 4 nations.

Or maybe that's what we need 1 more year. Which would put the next England coach on 3 years to go one step further at the next world cup, then a year after a world cup to find a replacement.

But I would not give another 4 years, so not another WC.