You really don't get what's just happened do you.

McNamara has proved the doubters wrong myself included - but I'm a big enough man to admit it.

He has created in this tournament a team ethos and pride that simply hasn't existed in the England (GB) shirt since SL and money became the be all and end all of the game and perhaps before that.

It's not McNamara's fault that there is still such a small talent pool in SL or that still so few players play NRL.

Before you point the finger at him and others look at yourself and how giddy you get every time your club (ditto others) sign some past it Aussie in a key position in your team. That's the real problem, greedy chairman, poor Coaches taking easy options and gullible fans thinking all that's Aussie is gold (so to speak).

If McNamara had the riches of the NRL to choose from we'd be finalist now - and we should be close if the SL and especially the RFL had been doing their jobs properly.

Nows the time to increase the comp not shrink it just to give greedy players like Jamie Peacock or mercenary Aussies a bigger share of the wad - because fine words aside that's actually what he means.

If we learn that then McNamara or his successor will eventually triumph.

For now McNamara must stay and be backed all the way. The way he has dealt with the pretenders like Chase, the troublemakers like Hock or the fools like Hardaker shows me a man willing to face down the enemy within and without.

I'm especially pleased with the Chase decision. He could have said Chase had improved and he has and was worth sticking with rather than admitting his boy hadn't really done enough. For whatever reason he didn't, in the most important game of his coaching life he put his pride to one side and made the very brave decision to play Widdop and boy it nearly paid of.

The blokes got guts and that I have to admire. His tactics will only get better now he's proved he can admit a mistake - ditto his selections. Thanks to the NRL his player pool will also improve hopefully.

He must stay for continuity and be allowed to finnish what he has clearly started this WC - that's a team that plays with pride, is willing to learn and play for each other - in other words take it seriously. This set up kept together will return with a massive desire to put yesterday right - that I'm sure of I saw their faces.

...and in the real world

Yes I do get it, we finished THIRD!! If this was his first tournament I would say, yes give him time. But he has had four years! And as I have mentioned, look at his results. How can anyone say they are good. This World Cup is what we have been building up to and we have achieved third.

Mcnamra didn't swallow his pride. That would have been last year and he would have dropped chase then and put in a better more in form half back. Not allowing the MOS to play for Scotland. Maybe if Widdop and Sinfield played more in the tournament together they would have been every better! But they didn't as he kept persisting with Chase.

This was the best England squad for a long time, and we came up short. It was one of the best games of RL I've ever seen. But a semi final in front of nearly 70k at Wembley, we were always going to come out firing.

Mcnamara had done some great things with the team, but as a COACH he has achieved nothing in 8 years st Bradford. surely thats enough to convince anyone. that counts more than good ideas such as yraining camps. How many more years do we have to carry on? He's put many good things in places that he should be congratulated on. But it's time to move on. Get some fresh ideas and a new approach while building on some of the good stuff Mcnamara has done.

I would like to see the list of intersted parties before making a judgement on seeing the back of mcnamara or not.

Quite seriously, who gives a rats what he did at Bradford? It has absolutely zero relevance to his performance as England coach.

The results against Australia and NZ were 20-28 and 18-20. England could and perhaps should have won both. The end was the same, but I assume you have seen GB/England absolutely smashed by both those teams? Quite recently in fact. I've seen us get hammered in Brisbane - absolutely humiliated. With players like Peacock, Morley, Harris, Long et al in the side. This England team is light years better then the last one to come down under.

But any improvement is somehow all down to the players and nothing to do with the coach. Really? He had 'four years' to prepare? Again, really? With his full squad available on a regular basis? Even half his squad? Even half his squad being able to play regular competitive matches? Or was it more like a few catch-up sessions with players when he could get them?

As for Chase, until literally a few weeks before the WC, there seemed very little chance that Widdopp would have been fit. So as a good coach did, he would have planned with Chase and Sinfield. If you take Widdopp out of the equation, all the other names bandied about for 7 are frankly laughably poor.

You can argue - understandably - that he could have dropped Chase a week earlier (I would have agreed with that), but to suggest he should have started with Widdopp against Australia for instance is barmy.

Which brings us to the other load of tosh. Brough is responsible for not even being considered for England. McNamara didn't force him out. He was told he wasn't an automatic selection. How bizarre for a coach to do that with a player who hasn't achieved anything much at all in a ten-year career.

It was Brough who took his bat home and decided he was Scottish rather than try to force his way into the squad and then the team by delivering performances that would demand his selection. So if you want to bag anyone or Brough's absence, bag Brough, pseudo-scot-dummy-spitter extraordinaire.

I'm 100% certain McNamara has made mistakes. But blaming him for the results without looking at the quality of the performances is not fair, suggesting that a narrow-heartbreaking defeat is the same as an embarrasing hiding is ridiculous, and suggesting that Brough wasn't solely responsible for his non-selection is laughable.

Well said. I cant argue with any of that.

Yup, he picked has beings in the past and this years squad was the best by a long distance (even taking into account Crabtree & Brough's omission), we should have beaten the Australians in the first match and thus we wouldn't have had the NZ match which we should have won anyway.
HIS mistakes are the difference between winning and losing here, the quality of players we had this time around made ALL the difference in the scores compared to last time.
HTH

He hasn't had 4 years. He took over in late April 2010, his first game in June 2010.
I'd be happy for McNamara to continue, I think he's done a decent job.

Ideally I'd like to see the coach being appointed on a 4 year contract to end just after each World Cup. The RFL to review the coach and his staff's performance over the whole period and then to decide whether to offer the current coach another contract or look for alternatives.

One good performance where we narrowly get defeated by NZ and that exonerates McNamara

I wonder if we had used Ablett some of those tired forwards may not have been as tired.


How long did Burrows play?

someone said 12 minutes is that right?



Who made those decisions ?

He has got to go - for the reasons given by Roy Haggerty.

Funny he is coming over all coy and sheepish now saying he isn't really sure whether wants to continue. Is this a clever way out for him if he gets binned i.e. he jumps before he is pushed.

McNamara has been very lucky.

We have an excellent pack who nearly won the semi-final, and could have beaten the Ozzie pack no problem. Not been able to say that, since the days of Brian McTigue, Dick Huddart and Vinty Karalius.

Our front rowers of Sam Burgess and James Graham are immense.

Chris Hill and Benny Westwood also played their part as well as the other change around players like Roby.


In the recent past, it was our backs that shone.

If only our backs had 'stepped up to the plate' ?

Even as a Wigan fan, apart from Lockers, our players contingent have been average at best.

Very surprised that Sam Tomkins has done virtually nothing for a 'World class player'.

Left wondering if he isn't crocked ?

But then again, I am one who think's he is wasted at full back.

First point, of course we should look at his Bradford results. We were jumping for joy when he left. He has NO history

I cant be bothered arguing with Leeds fans about Brough anymore. Like I said, in June McGuire was selected in front of him despite Brough been the best player in league. Even Leeds wouldn't have had Mcguire in front of Brough. One of MANY situations handles poorly by Mcnmara.

Stick with Mcnamara we will push NZ and OZ
Close again as have too good a squad not too. But we won't anything, as Mcnamara doesn't have the experience of winning anything.

Can't fault this.

For all that I've enjoyed watching the likes of Tonga and France, there are three credible and competitive nations that can win a tournament like this one. England, NZ and Australia. Just three. And the harsh fact is that we lost against both our peer nations and have finished third.

On top of that, contrary to the popular myth that England have been better organised and prepared, it's been a shambolic campaign. Losing one squad player to poor discipline is bad, but losing two? Getting beaten by Italy, a team that should have had 70 put on them with ease, and then getting shirty in a press conference? Spending several years bigging up your controversial half back choice then abandoning it just before the biggest game since 2008? Voluntarily playing a tight, brutal game against the World Champions with only 16 players, and even then only using one of those for a short time?

The World Cup overall has been a brilliantly pulled off by the RFL. It has been a superb showcase for the sport. But England have not performed. We shouldn't mix up the elation from a fantastic tournament with the actual results of the national team. England have been poor in this competition.

The result against NZ was the worst possible one for England. It allows us to believe that the tournament has been okay for England, that we're there or thereabouts, that the different bounce of a ball and we'd be talking about a different situation. It allows the complacency to deepen.

The fact is, in a three way competition, we've just come third. Again. We haven't won an international tournament involving Australia for 41 years. I remember that we used to be competitive against NZ, but they have moved up a notch in the last ten years and we haven't.

I can recall bouts of GB/England soul searching every autumn for my entire life. Every time it was "we're closing the gap, we're nearly there". And we weren't.

Something fundamental has to change in British RL, something deeper than a reshuffle of the SL pack or the appointment of a different national coach. And yesterday's result, which don't forget was a failure, has only put back the day of reckoning yet again. It will allow the cowards who run the game to hide behind their fiction that everything is alright and we're nearly there. The same fiction that has served us so badly for the three decades since 1982.

As for whether McNamara should stay or go, I don't think it matters. The issues in British RL can't be fixed by one man pulling together a squad for a few weeks.

On the flip side, is there anyone here who would like to see him take over at their club? Really? I thought not.


My gut feel is that the man is a good administrator and I agree with the suggestion above that he should be running the England team alongside a coach with a lot of experience of winning short tournaments. Simply put, in the immediate future, we should be looking down the list of recent Queensland coaches to see who would want the job.

But you can put lipstick on a pig and it's still a pig. So yet another new coach won't make that much difference.