A great idea. Would be mutually beneficial.

It'd be great to see and it would be a great learning curve for a young England side.

Parts of his game is missing at 6 though as well. Tomkins is such a talent he needs to be on the field but we need to find where we can fit him in because whilst a natural talent he doesn't really fit into a position at the moment.

Matty Smith did nothing but kick the ball, a couple of cracking bombs but several straight to the defender. If he had a fraction of the creativity of Widdop we wouldn't have had to rely on kicks. You could bring Deacon out of the box to do what Smith did.
Overall the front row were excellent, back row very poor. Watkins the biggest waste of talent since Newlove. Hall MoM.
Tomkins to 6/7, Hardaker to FB.

Definitely.

Enjoyable game, the Samoan passion and intensity is fabulous, great set of fans as well.

If, and looking at that, it's a big if, we can cut out the basic errors, we'll go alright. Not saying we'll win the thing but we should be competitive.

I thought the centres both defended well, the halves showed a few nice touches, good kicking game from Smith and both hookers played to a plan. The pack stood up to the expected ferocity of the Samoans and whilst not wanting to jump on the bandwagon, I've got to agree with concerns at the amount of ball Tomkin's allows to bounce.

Decent'ish kicking game but Smith can't tackle for **** and the Aussies will target him all night.
Hardaker at FB and move Tomkins into the halves with Widdop,
Drop Joel Tomkins & Westerman and we might have a chance next week.

I think he's getting caught in two minds as to his own position at the moment. I think he went to the NRL with it in his mind that defences are so much tighter (which they are) so he's tried to become more of a creative force and he is. His defensive work is good as well but he's gone further backwards dealing with high kicks. I don't think it's a lack of bravery but more a lack of confidence in catching the balls in traffic (and sometimes in no traffic at all).

In terms of what he lacks at 6 I'd say it's possibly just a kicking game but he's actually pretty good when given the opportunity. He needs to develop it but he won't get the chance to do that at fullback.

Hall MoM, are you sure?!

George Burgess/Godinet/Leilua for MoM imo

I thought both Smith and Widdop were good - it was nice to see England with two halves who can kick a ball. As people have said, the front row played well, but the back row was sketchy. I thought Shenton looked vulnerable defensively; I'd consider trying Hardaker at left centre next week. Overall we gave ourselves too much work to do in hot conditions with all of those mistakes in the first half, and it showed later in the game. We showed some character to hang on, though.

Good hard test for first match of the tournament. All that tackling in the first 20 minutes definitely took its toll. Full back did some good work in defence but being able to catch a bomb must be a prerequisite for the position I would've thought. Not sure about MoM but will go for Hill despite "that" lapse!

A bit harsh that.

New Zealand 'B' and 'C' might be a more appropriate moniker

Well thankfully that was Samoa and not Australia or New Zealand. The ball control, discipline, and line speed will need to improve next week. he pundits were praising the 2 hookers but I thought they were quite poor with their distribution, and they seemed to get bumped off in defence a lot. Hopefully we've got some of the mistakes, and rustiness out of the system and can improve next week because we're in trouble if we don't.

Individually all the props were good, and really carried well but, the back row was shocking overall. We really, really missed Flanders and Burgess.
The backs did OK given limited ball, both wingers returned well, and both centres defended very well I thought. Tomkins however looks like Richie Mathers defending kicks at times, and I'm not sure we can afford to carry on playing him there.

I thought Tom was better than George actually.

Smith made the pass of the night (a blinder) to Tomkins for Watkins try. He's not going to beat defender after defender but with very limited ball he was excellent today and offered a nice balance alongside Widdop.

He above anyone (anyone of the players who's places aren't guaranteed anyway)deserves a shot next week.