You make it sound so easy

The problem is not who is doing the kicking, its where on the field they are kicking from. If your 5th tackle is on your 20m line, the chances are the kick return will be pretty good. So we need to get at least to the halfway line in a set to have an effective kicking game.

Would deffo have him in the squad, but we need a kicking game and for now he does not have an international class kicking game. Brough may be out of form, but he does have the best kicking game in the league (plus he is the most rounded English 7 in the league). How about having Lomax coming off the bench as interchange hooker. Plus he will have the versatility to cover half, full back and centre.

Spot on. Brough was the form half in the first part of the year but Lomax has passed him now

Lomax has got great distribution and when he attacks the line he is excellent. Plus he is defensively good as well

Funny isn’t it – a year ago we were bemoaning the loss of Eastmond but for me Lomax is a far better all round player

I understand what you say about the form thing, but Brough brings something that England have been desperately been missing for years. Brough may be slightly out of form now but when he is playing well he is as good an allround player as Lomax + a kicking game. I think having DB and Widdop at half gives us balance. Lomax is certainly a talent and should be in the squad mind and included somewhere.

6 Widdop
7 Lomax
13 Sinfield

For me we should be looking to start building a team this year for the 2013 World Cup, and its a great opportunity to get our young players used to eachother over the next 2 years to prepare us.

Tomkins at 1, Widdop at 6, Lomax at 7 and Roby at 9 has great potential and 4 of the best attacking players we have, so why not give them a shot this year and the experience will be valuable down the line for them. For me its about time we ditched the old guard such as Morley, Peacock etc who are too old for international rugby now and give other people an opportunity to show what they can do - after all we have never managed to beat the Aussies more than once a year with the old lot in their prime so cant do much worse

I agree that Brough brings a quality kicking game to the team

Looking at the key positions and those that appear nailed on for a spot, we have

1. Tomkins

6. Widdop

9. Roby

I haven’t seen enough of Widdop this year to rate kick kicking game but other posters suggest that Smith and Cronk take this duty at Melbourne. Tomkins seems to have an improving long kicking game and Roby sometimes kicks from dummy half (and while this is a good option to get a quick kick away, I am not convinced about his quality there)

I guess the critical decision is therefore half and loose forward, with the two main candidates for each sport being Brough and Lomax and O’Loughlin and Sinfield

In the first half of the year I would have gone for Brough and O’Loughlin without doubt but Lomax’s form is such that I would certainly consider playing Lomax and Sinfield – with Lomax the main distributor, Widdop a running half and Sinfield kicking

If we were to go with Brough and O’Loughlin, Brough takes the organisation and kicking duties while O’Loughlin would perform his Wigan role of high work rate complemented by some creative passing

The mistake would be to go in without a recognised and quality field kicker as this is where England have suffered in the past

Easy solution.. Bring in Lomaskell. You can't play Batman without Robin!

In my option he’s average with a world class kicking game

I'm sure he's gutted.

Very impressed with Jonny Lomax, and after initially being reluctant, i agree he should be in the running. We've a World Cup coming up in a few years, so really, whether he's ready or not now shouldnt make a difference. Put him in, and get him some international experience ready for then.

I thought Gaskell had a great game at stand-off too. He's definitely one to watch.