Also when Hodgson plays, him and Luke Gale are like "siamese twins" just standing too close together which negates Luke Gales game, Hodgson a very good player but is too robotic, whereas Roby is far more expansive and has a lot more variation to his game.
I,m not sure if its a good idea to play both of them in the 17 as both can play for 80 mins with perhaps Roby maintaining quality for more minutes, we lose momentum when Graham and O'Loughin go off so would sooner have an extra forward who can make meters.

Taylor did nothing wrong against France but i don't think he did enough to edge out T Burgess and Walmsley from being our two front row inter changes. He is a good player to bring in if anything happens to our 4 props for the rest of the competition though.

Agree about Hodgson. Watching Canberra they tend to leave him on the pitch when they bring Baptiste on and put him at 13 and in general he gets in the way and spoils plays.

It's clear Bennett doesn't trust Percival to hold his own physically. He looked way out of his depth last season in the internationals, and I think Bennett is mindful of that. Personally, I would've picked Percival for this game, but I can understand Bennett's decision.

You can’t really compare stats for this season... Bateman only played 12 games, Percival 28.

The one thing Bateman is doing is making good ground for us and he managed that not only against France (150m) and Lebanon (118m) but against the more physical challenge that is Australia (152m). I'm not sure Percival would manage those sort of inroads against the Aussies (although he did do well against France with 151m) and defensively I wouldn't be convinced.

Bateman wouldn't be my choice though but I can see why he's picking him. What I don't get is why not Currie in the centre? He's a more skilled ball handler and is quicker then Bateman. He is also coming back from a bad injury, which the slightly less demanding position of centre would help protect a little.

They should swap round for me.

I would have gone for Percival. I haven't been impressed with Bateman's online defence and we're not going to beat the best by being 'solid' but by playing with some flair and taking any chances we get.

With Hodgson, the one thing he would do against NZ/Aus is draw the attention of defenders in a way that Roby won't, because they are aware of how good he can be. Whether England can utilise that properly is another issue.

RUGBY LEAGUE WORLD CUP 2017GAME ON GROUP Qtr : England v Papua New Guinea - Sun - 05:00:00 GENERAL CHAT ABOUT THE GAME, BUILD UP, THE ACTION AS IT HAPPENS AND AFTERMATH BELOW.

Yeah got to agree there. If Bennett thinks Percival isn't up to it, I'm surprised Currie hasn't been gven the same chance Bateman has in at least one of the games this WC. Like you say his skill set and pace are better suited to than Bateman's. Maybe they've given him a go in training and Bateman's looked better, that's the only thing I can think of. But saying that, it would be hard to judge his quality in that position off training runs especially with just a 24 man squad.

Tbh though with alll this sticking 2nd rowers into , simply because they appear to want some size there. For me it makes it more the head scratcher why Shenton wasn't picked. The blokes 6ft3' and 95kg's, sound defensively & can actually pass the ball to his wing.

Yeah Gildart is definitely one for the future for England and it was a proper shame what happened to him this year, with that bad injury, because after his good start to the season, I was looking forward to see if he'd continue to improve. I mean the lads only 21 so there's time to add some bulk to his frame.
Saying that I'm not one that thinks size is the be all and end all, particularly in the Threequarters. As long as you have a good RL brain, know your position inside and out, have a good tackling technique and have some pace, size is just an added bonus to those skills imo.

In fairness to Gildart he came back very well from his injury and was probably our only bright spot in what was otherwise a really poor second half to the year.

I agree with you on the size issue. We seem to be getting obsessed with having huge outside backs but if players have other skills that make them difficult to handle, it isn't the be all and end all. I've not seen an English centre with footwork as good as Gildarts since Martin Gleeson.

Really? Watkins on his day has some of the best footwork ive seen from any player. Id have a whole host of english centres above him for there footwork, that are even playing now; Watkins, Percival, Shenton, Cudjoe... Ive probably been more impressed with Jake Connor at Hull who i think has been great this year.

I wouldn't be surprised to see Gildart come back 6-7kg heavier next season given his decision not to play with Italy in the World Cup.

There would be a certain irony if that gain came from eating a lot of pasta.

Liam Sutcliffe could be a future England centre.