Hope he doesn't take it to heart - no problem with him, It was the Simth and Smith farce that was a problem!

I've coached games for a few years now and I called it after the first try where Smith was in no mans land something should have been changed and it just showed Tony Smith's ineptness as an international coach doing nothing at all about it and his decision not to do anything about it until half time is what cost England the game.

I have gotta say i have not been impressed with Smiths man management so far.

last week he took Moore off after a couple of mistakes ( but he seemed a bit out of it after a heavy tackle) and then did not bring him back on.

This week he takes off Briscoe who did nothing wrong and leaves two players on Smith and Mc Guire who were defensive liabilities.

I hope he does not screw up the confidence of two potentially very good players who could be England players for a long time.

who have you coached and by the way no player in this earth would have stoped a couple of those Aussie trys.

The only ting Briscoe should have done was to go towards Inglis when he made the break in the first half, first and foremost, the danger is the guy who is carrying the ball. He should have come off his wing and tried to close down Inglis.

Apart from that he did nothing at all wrong, and didnt deserve to be taken off at all.

Briscoe will learn, he got left out to dry when our defence stayed rooted in the middle of the pitch several times, I agree, Lee Smith and McGuire where of no help to him what so ever.
He played right in front of us in the East stand, he got a knock with about 7 minutes left in the first half, didnt look bad, but the lad was in some discomfort.

If a try can be scored, a try can be stopped.

I have to agree, high in the stand you could see our poor defence structure, our right hand side was shot to bits, they had two extra men down that side several times, the Aussies used the same moves 12 months ago, Tony Smith has learned nothing from that mauling.

An unbaised opinion would be that he showed his lack of experience. He was not invloved in the defence at all, when other wingers would have pushed in and condensed the space he stayed glued to the touchline. I rate him as a player and I think he has a big future ahead, but he's not ready yet and his lack of game time this year really showed.

You can bag Lee Smith all you want but for some inexplicable reason he there was no second row on the right side of defence leaving him alone against what the Aussies regard as a centre who is better than Mal Meninga. You wouldn't have that formation at SL club level let alone against Greg Inglis and Billy Slater.

Tony Smith made the right correction at half time. A shame he didn't do it after 20 minutes.

The young lad did nothing wrong all time he was on pitch.

The defence was pretty shocking on briscoes side by IMO the wrong defensive line.

Why did tony smith have mcguire outside smith?

Smith was defending inside mcguire which confussed our defensive line.

If Maguire and Smith are next to each other in the defensive pattern next week, we have BIG problems. However, who was the back-row forward that should have been defending alongside that channel, and where was he?
I honestly can't see what we can do to strengthen but that edge will be targetted next week so something needs to change. Perhaps Eastmond at 7 and defending that edge rather than McGuire, who couldn't tackle his was out of a paper bag? Perhaps moving the more defensive Shenton over to that side so at least someone over there can tackle?

That's how I saw it. He was shown not to be the fastest though. Once they broke, they were gone. To be fair to Smith, he seemed a different player when he went to the wing.

I think it was JP that should have been defending out on smith and mcguire side but IMO JP shouldn't have been 2nd row.

JP has been top prop for England at international level for last 5 years and shouldn't have been playing 2nd row as he's not mobile enough to defend on the flanks.

Burgess and ellis should be in 2nd row as both are mobile.

Lets keep JP at what he does best.

Things like this are why I think Tony Smith as a coach means our players play below their capabilities.

- Australia were always going to be at their most dangerous in Inglis' channel
- A McGuire and Smith 6 & 4 combination was always going to be a weak part of our defensive line anyway
- Add on top playing the most inexperienced winger in the squad on that edge, when the winger needs to lead those defence calls, and you're in massive trouble before a ball has been passed
- As if that wasn't enough, playing Peacock as a 3rd prop was always going to mean our defence there was under-supported because of his lack of lateral mobility, making cover defence on a half break next to impossible

Put those 4 things together and you get 22 points down after 23 minutes. Make the right adjustments and you have an Aussie side with little penetration, and a chance of victory frustratingly visible despite giving a 26 points start.

Coaching errors, plain and simple. Same thing happened in the World Cup. How many more times Tony? Hopefully, a bit like Bobby Robson in Italia90, the 2nd half actually saw him find a decent team by accident and all may not be lost last week - although knowing Smith he will probably ignore that effective set-up, and send us out with one hand tied behind our backs again