A big slap in the face for France and very regressive. Make it a series perhaps, but the big egg on the face moment is when the all stars kick our !

Would we be happy to let the likes of Ryan Hoffman and Pat Richards play in a game like this?

It read's as though SL clubs have already agreed to it, but the details have yet to be released. I'd imagine it'll be something a long the lines of, no more than three oversea's players from any one team. Even though that would make the oversea's team weaker than it otherwise would be.

I don't see why that would be too much of a problem, who would expect England to beat overseas stars in the Premiership in Football?

Should be a better match than watching England spend 75mins attacking the French line and scoring at will, and 5mins watching England trying to remember how their defensive line was supposed to work.



I would be.

I'm happy with this on one condition (I don't know any details btw) that Wales play France so the French still have a match.

It would only work as with the similar game in Oz where a maximum of 2 players from each club are allowed to be picked. Theres no way clubs like Wigan, Warrington and Leeds would risk sending 4 or 5 players to both the England and "All Stars" teams.

are SL clubs obliged to release their overses players for the match ?

Finally! Sounds like the RFL are beginning to listen to fans good ideas.

Now IMO it should be on a weekend on its own, where there are no other fixtures, that way there will be bigger interest, higher attendance and higher level of quality players instead of restricted club players.

Tomkins vs Pattern
Goulding vs Monaghan
Shenton vs King
Bridge vs Carmont
Hall vs Richards
McGuire vs Finch
Eastmond vs Dobson
Graham vs Perry
Roby vs Monaghan
Morley vs Mason
Burgess vs Hoffman
Ellis vs Puletua
O'Loughlin vs O'Donnell

Tomkins vs Fitzgibbon
Robinson vs Leuluai
Fielden vs Cross
Westwood vs Lima

Makes England look very weak though



I'd pay to see it.

Regressive for France but i'm not French and how is England battering France year on year a good thing for either country.

Play a team that will test us not the French who will only get better when their domestic game improves.

Not convinved with this idea really. Sure, I'll watch what should be an entertaining match but what England RL get out of it I'm not so sure.

For the game to work properly and have the best players made available for the All Stars team, it needs to be scheduled on a free weekend. In their infinite wisdom though, the RFL have rushed into this having already released the fixture list for next season, and therefore there isn't a free weekend throughout the season to play the game on, so they'll just slot it in on a weekend in June when there doesn't look to be any exciting top of the table clashes!

As a Wigan fan, I have absolutely no interest in seeing stars such as Leuluai, Richards, Finch etc. playing in a meaningless friendly against England when they should be playing that very weekend for Wigan, the club paying their wages.

I expect to see a thrown together All Stars XIII, partially made up of journey men because the real stars in SL would rather play for their clubs and therefore this match won't be half as difficult as it could be for England, and in reality we'll get b*gger all out of it. As if a team of All Stars who will train together for maybe three days prior to the match are going to give us any more preperation for facing Aus/NZ than the French do.

I echo calls for the French to have a friendly against the Welsh at the same time as this game.

As I say, nice concept but poorly organised from the RFL.

Bah humbug!

*A further whinge: this'll get a crap crowd! Given the WCC won't sell 25000 tickets, I'd be surprised to see this get 15k, especially with the RFL's marketing!

Wouldnt be happy playing a team with missing potentionally Tomkins x 2 Lockers Fielden Goulding Tommy Paaaaaaaat George and Hoffman missing

Cancel the fixture because we flog them every time?
The Aussies flog us every time, do we cancel playing against them?

The French would be better if they were coached better rather than 'Bobbie Goulding' who 5 years ago was coaching Widnes St Maries, that's why they have gone down hill recently. France need to get rid of the Aussies in their team and blood their youngsters.

If the RFL are serious about promoting the game in France they need a national team to be proud of, if the RFL provides dispensation for SL clubs to take a young French player on loan with each club taking one and training them and have them play in their reserves, who knows we could uncover some gems.

Not how I see it.

I don't understand how England thrashing France once a year mid way through a season improves either nation. England don't get a challenge and so you don't really learn enough from the match. France struggle to gain interest, as the French people will not be interested in watching France get hammered in a one off test in June every year. Plus I don't see what their squad gains from it. The whole event needed addressing and rectifying with a viable alternative & I think this may be it.

I would still like to see France play a test. A build up match before the England v Overseas match between France & Wales would be an excellent idea. We have a welsh team and a french team so it includes every team in Super League. Wales get the opportunity to prepare for the four nations and France will play in a competitive match.

From an England perspective we will get a much sterner challenge and the game subsequently has more appeal to supporters. I've never seen England get out of third gear against France & they've still won very comfortably. As hopeless as Steve McNamara is, he isn't going to learn a lot about his players because England wont be facing opposition like this when they play New Zealand and Australia. At least this game will tell us more about the team. I also disagree with people saying we wont be competitive or will get hammered, you must remember our lads come up against these Super League players every week in their respective positions. A win would give our lads a huge confidence boost. Nevertheless, even if England lost, I don't think it would be a particularly bad thing. At least we've had a competitive match. The whole event has much more appeal to me as a supporter than the test match against France.

I hope the RFL go through with it and look forward to the event.

The article regarding this suggests McNamara is also building a 'England Lions' Squad of players who have potential to play for England, maybe France vs England Lions would be a good build up to this. France vs a squad of players such as Liam Farrell, Paul Clough, Lee Mossop, possibly even Gareth Widdop would be good.

It's not exactly an 'all-star' team though is it. It's a team of former NRL players. Current Kangaroo contenders are not playing over here and the Kiwi's only used Tommy L from SL.

A true all star team would have the likes of Lockyer, Inglis, Slater, Marshall et al...

Just a few years back, the Kiwi's were getting pummelled by the roos, now they're world number ones, if they'd been told to go back to playing PNG for example would this be so? As someone else said, one of the biggest problems the French have is their coaching infrastructure imho. but you could say that about England

Good idea. I think they should limit the overseas team to two players per SL club though, otherwise there'd probably be 3-4 clubs losing 4-5 players and risking getting them injured for a one-off friendly

'England are set to take on an all-stars team drawn from leading overseas players based in Engage Super League this summer.

The fixture, which will replace the annual mid-season international against France on the second weekend of June, has been agreed by the clubs but has yet to be ratified.'

This sounds crackin! Much better than watchin England drum 60 past France.

So, judging from this past year, who do you will be in the allstar team from Wigan? and overall?

I dont any player from MY club repersenting the so called all star team as its going to be either midweek or at the weekend which will deseremate OUR club if we have 2/3 selected aswell as the 3 England players.

So you would feel this way if they were getting selected for France, Australia or New Zealand?

Last year we had an international and saturday and our boys played the following day against Quins think your getting a bit worked up - i think this a good thing for the game!

If they where getting picked for France/NZ/Australia it can be jusified as there a proper nation unlike this made up idea by the RFL i just dont want OUR players picking up injuries in a mengliness game.

Have advocated it for years and it is the best we can manage to give the England squad decent opposition prior to which otherwise they will not get.
A very good idea and I hope it works.

Common sense applies here. If you have so many players selected (think it's 4) then you can postpone the game. Wigan wont suddenly be without Sam Tomkins, Joel Tomkins, Sean O'loughlin, Darrell Goulding, Ryan Hoffman, Brett Finch, Amos Roberts, Pat Richards and Jeff Lima one weekend.

I hope there will be a rule where you can only select so many players from one club. Otherwise it will be mainly all Wigan, Saints, Leeds and Warrington players playing in the fixture.

cue mysterious injuries as in wendyball meaningless friendlies

That's a very narrow minded viewpoint. The game needs a much improved international scene if we wish to grow, which will inturn benefit Wigan (greater sky money etc).

As for injuries, it's just part of sport. I don't think for a second it's a meaningless game either. What about pre-season games? You don't get a point for them, but players could quite easily pick up an injury? What about training games?

The only thing I would hope is a cap on how many players from one club you can select for the fixture. The top four teams - Wigan, Saints, Leeds and Warrington (possibly Huddersfield) - would make up the vast majority of both sides and I hope we can avoid a situation like that.

Sounds like a great match and I would certainly be attending, is there any venues in the pipe line?