England look very strong going forward aside from maybe looking a little lightweight upfront. At international level you need size and power in the front row and that's the one area where we've taken a dip after having Graham, Walmsley and the Burgess family available to us. On the plus side, Lees and Havard are very durable and solid defenders.

Havard played well, Lees was probably the smallest prop on the pitch and held his own, Burgess is past his best.

Is Wardle available for Leeds? Thompson in that side would be a massive boost. I'll be interested as always to watch the game back, but it struck me afterwards that I don't recall seeing too much from the very highly rated Nanai? What did you guys think?

Wardle isn’t available

I feel like this England team has done a complete flip from where they were a decade ago.

Ten years ago, we had some of the best forwards in the world but our backline was severely lacking.
Ten years on, we have electric and exciting backs, but our forwards are nowhere near where they used to be; except in the second row with KPP and Nsemba. They still did the job and did it well. I just can't help but wonder how powerful the England side would be if we had the same forwards today. Can you imagine the Burgess brothers, Graham, Lockers etc combined with this generation's backs?

Still, this is a strong England team despite missing a few key players, and I'm genuinely excited for the future. Although I find some of Wane's selections questionable, to the point where I questioned his capability, I'm confident he's the right person for the job after watching that game tonight. Some of the rugby put on show was great, from both teams. Looking forward to the two games.

I think some opposition fans are realising now that Wane isn't Wigan biased, he's just extremely loyal to players who've done well for him in the past and that leads to guys like Hill getting in the squad and Nsemba not getting a spot in the team, while players who've not had their best years, such as Burgess, McMeekan and Bateman get in. I've not real issue with it in the main, you can never pick an international side solely on form but certain players absolutely smash the door down and make it impossible not to pick them and Nsemba has done that. It wouldn't be Bateman I'd have been looking at to leave out, it would've been one of Knowles or McMeekan on the bench and I'd have used Nsemba to cause some chaos alongside Mickey Lewis. You don't need two grafting loose forwards in your 17, especially when your starting loose forward is comfortably the best one in the squad but you could use Knowles at prop if you're desperate to get him in.

Outside of the Nsemba stuff though I was happy enough with it all. Both sides will be better for the run out but we're looking good. That England backline is as good as anything we've had for a long while.

i think the Samoan's were definitely undercooked and would have benefitted from a game before that test

re England (i'm still in the GB camp having been brought up watching Britain), its good to see us score some well worked tries through hard graft up front, and then a bit of class out wide. Its also good to know that we have Wardle, Marshall, Makinson (know he's probably retired from international now), Percival, Handley still available to come into the backline, and it wouldnt suffer

onto the forwards, and as others have mentioned, our pack looks lacking in true world class stars, but we know Havard and Lees can both do long minutes at intensity, add Thompson to that next week, and we have 3 effective props and can then use either McMeekan or Burgess, and its likely one of those wont be in the team next week. Knowles is in a strange position, as he wont get a gig in front of Radley, so going to be very sply used

Lewis on the bench proved to be the right call. Harry organising everything, and letting Williams do the running. All the pre-match pundits agreed that Harry was the right decision, and it should have been Smith and Williams / Lewis, not a pick between Smith and Lewis. They even showed the SL stats to show that Lewis should be the player to pick but all said in the big games they would only go with Smith as he controls the show, and his kicking into the corners builds control and pressure

re the debate on 2nd rows, KPP was quiet initially but grew into the game, and got his offloading game going causing problems. Bateman was what we know he is, a grafter, and also a nuisance, getting under the skin of the Samoans. Does Junior deserve a chance, probably yes given the season he's had, but equally, happy for him to be involved to get the experience, but then get a good off season to refresh, and come back firing for next season. Again, with the pack, we have some good depth, with Dupree, Faz, Minchella, Smith (leeds) Mulhearn all missing out, and wouldnt let us down if selected

I think i have a good idea why International RL doesn't work or grow in this country, yesterday was an awful experience.

Started off with the national anthems, plenty near us not bothering to stand and talking all the way through them and being generally disrespectful.

Then you had the wally's with their "Who are ya" and "Come on Wigan!" rubbish. Was a good moment when Leilua turned to him and shouted "Samoa!".

When the Samoa player got into the face of Lewis lots of people near us shouting things such as "Punch him!" which led on to talk of their shared disdain for Lewis. He is playing for your country FFS, get behind him! The irony is the Salford fans where talking about how disrespectful the idiot shouting at the beginning was, but then didn't find it disrespectul at all as they wanted the samoan to do them a favour and "drop the little sh*t".

These sort of comments went on throughout the game from numerous different groups near us, typically aimed at both Welsby and Lewis but also some aimed at Williams.

As for the Salford fans behind us, they must have been upset that no Salford player had been picked as they had turned up just to watch "Welsby and Lewis get smashed / injured" and also to support Samoa over their own country. They actually left in a huff with around 15 mins left because England was winning!

Went to the bogs at one point and there was a Hull KR fan in the concourse shouting and bawling about how Mikey Lewis was being shunted, it was a disgrace he was on the bench for the Sake of Smith and how because he was man of steel he should have been a guarenteed starter. Like literally shouting and arguing with people over it, saying how he had come all the way from Hull to watch Lewis and he wasn't even playing (he was on the bench but ok).

Yeah, i don't think i will bother going next week, will just watch it from the sanity of my own couch. Shame too because it was actually a decent game, a little slow and lacking aggression at times for an international but decent all the same.

I thought the game was an anti-climax all be it England were very strong. I agree that club rivalries get in the way and there will be supporters struggling to cheer on Lewis or Welsby because they don't like them. There are Saints fans too that won't support England purely because Wane is the coach, its mad really.

I do actually think though that Nsemba should've played over Bateman whether people accuse Wane of Wigan bias or not. He was sensational last season and is an unknown entity to Samoa. We know what Bateman does and he's a shadow of the player he once was. Would've been nice to see Nsemba on that stage and how he handled it. He's the future going forward not Bateman.

Love Rugby League fb page reporting Australia coming over here for a 3 match series next year.
If they're available, Newcastle, Everton. Tottenham/Arsenal/Wembley, bit of ambition please

Bateman was outstanding yesterday, he topped the tackle count.
As long as I've watched RL the best balanced back threes have always has a runner, a ball player and a tackler.
I would love to have seen Nsemba play, but that back three with Knowles coming on was about right. Maybe Nsemba on the bench for the 2nd game as an interchange for KPP.

But how else does he get experience at that level? We want to see Nsemba up against the Aussies next year, no use playing him against France or against an Exiles team. A team like Samoa would've been a good opportunity to see how he copes against a big physical pack.

I see similarities between the Lewis/Smith situation.

People want to see Nsemba play but ultimately there is a lot for him to work on. He’s a freak of an athlete who we want to see play but the coaches will be patient and bring him through when they feel he is ready.

He’s yet to play a full season in SL, Bateman is a tough battle hardened player who won’t let you down on occasions like this.

I personally don’t subscribe to the give him a shirt for experience. Test shirts need to mean more than that. You need to be ready and it’s not an arena to blood a player. We need to win this series, at the moment Bateman is best placed to do that in view of the coaches and it’s hard to disagree on the evidence of yesterday.

The only thing I'd disagree on here is you don't need both Radley and Knowles. One or the other. Both are capable of 80 mins and nothing is added by the substitution. That's where Nsemba could get game time and actually add to the rotation instead of what is basically a wasted interchange.

I agree but would you have him starting, I wouldn't.
If he was to come on from the bench, who would you have left out from the four subs yesterday?

Interestingly, assuming Thompson is going to play next week, who gets left out.
Maybe the MRP can do us a favour and ban a few!!