Re: England vs. Samoa : Mon Oct 27, 2014 3:48 am  

A ptb in Aus is 2-2.5 sec faster than what is allowed by Wigan in the UK.

Re: England vs. Samoa : Mon Oct 27, 2014 7:01 am  

BrisbaneRhino wrote:

I think you must have watched a different England game if you're optimistic about our chances vs Aus. They'll not lose their 1 and 6 during the game again - sadly, as I'd take an England win under virtually any circumstances.

England's defence was really awful in that game. Linespeed was non-existent (how often were they back-pedalling on virtually every tackle because they allowed a quick PTB?), schoolboy on-line defence and Tomkins really is an accident waiting to happen under high kicks.

As for Wire players, Hill looks very comfortable at that level, as he did last year. Clarke has a touch of class as well, although I'd really prefer him to play for 80 mins so we didn't need a second hooker in the 17.

There's a good chance DCE will be out and we will have O'loughlin back. I haven't seen the stats yet, but it felt the Aussies made far more errors than us (without the sun/heat) and the Kiwi forwards completely steamrolled them. Cut the errors, smarten up around the ruck and we will win. If we win we make history, 100 years on from the Rorke's Drift Test. For mine, there is no bigger incentive in our sport.

Re: England vs. Samoa : Mon Oct 27, 2014 12:17 pm  

England did make a lot of errors. However, the one postitive is that for the first time in years in an opening game of a tournament we looked like we had a genuine attacking structure and ideas to break open a defence. Widdop's pass to Farrel for his try ( on the back of quick cross-field passing movement ) was a good example. To beat Australia you need to spend at least 50% of the game on attack. NZ on Saturday probably had 70% of the game on attack. Don't give them lots of minutes to conjure up some of their magic.