Australia v England

[up the junction]

Said exactly the same W.W .I remember a few years ago When we played Australia in a game which we saw two refs used ,one brit ,think it was Ganson in first half and an Aussie ref second half.Ganson gave us nowt and let Australia have everything ,then in the second half ,the Aussie official punished us fro everything .It's like they have a right to every 50/50 call and the officials are frightened of upsetting them.No way are they that far ahead of us in the level playing field ,if we get the rub of the green we can beat them as seen on previous occasions.

[Panchitta Marra]

I don't think Hicks was close enough to make that call on Josh!

spoke to a close friend of hicks when I was on holiday in cyprus at the time hock threw the ball in at the stains fans. This bloke said that hicks is a saints fan. Maybe hicks just couldnt help himself when josh got close to the touchline. LOL.

[cpwigan]

Blaming the match officials is LAME. They perhaps made a couple of mistakes BUT far less than our players from 20 minutes onwards.

[Aluaka]

The match officials were far from perfect - but if the team was good enough to win they could, and should, overcome those issues.

A few observations I made of England:

- Sam did pretty well - making a few good speedy running moves - he was certainly a target for tough Aussie tackling

- Josh had too few opportunities and he did well to create his try. Watkins had at least 3 passes where a quick pass to Josh would've created great wing moves and try potentials but his greed killed the chances dead. Golding in that position would've been superb!

- Sinfield didn't do much - for a change! I also didn't see Roby or Chase making much of an impact.

- the Burgess boys again had great presence and are powerhouses.

- even Ben Westwood made his presence known and put in a fair performance early on

The Australians, when they got themselves together, managed some really smooth and quick passing moves - they're the ones to beat in the final without a shadow of a doubt!

I've yet to watch the TV coverage of the match, but they're my views from a nice high viewpoint in the South stand (unfortunately without a good view of the screen as we were TOO high and the back of the screen our end blocked it!)

Tip: if you ever go in the top section of an end, get tickets for row 14 and below for a good view of the screen - we were in row 21!

[up the junction]

Blaming the match officials is LAME. They perhaps made a couple of mistakes BUT far less than our players from 20 minutes onwards.

Rubbish CP two Aus tries came directly from match officials appalling mistakes .I know we were nt perfect "far from it" but had Hicks not given that call ,and ref ruled in favour of obstruction on Widdop /Sinfeild , it would have been a different outcome.Also what about when Ryan Hall took the ball from there spilling it in the tackle and the ref gave them the scrum saying it was the same as Callum Watkins play earlier on Greg Ingliss .Appalling decision .But hey I'm only patriotic

[Owd Codger]

Blaming the match officials is LAME. They perhaps made a couple of mistakes BUT far less than our players from 20 minutes onwards.

Not blaming the officials, just pointing out that that they were not good enough for a game of this level and why do our officials like Hick have to do something which a Aussie official would never do against his own country.

The problem in games between us and the Aussies is that there is not a Referee from a neutral country of good enough standard to handle a game between our two countries.

As for the game, we might have stood a better chance if players like Ferrell, Graham, Mcllorum and O'loughlin had been playing.

Perhaps even Hock, if had not as usual, acted stupid.

[oldhooker]

We did not disgrace ourselves by holding them to an eight points difference but once again our half backs and centres were ineffective.The most worrying aspect for me is the Aussies are slow starters and will improve a lot.Widdop must play and I hope Lockers is fit soon.

[phild1]

We need half backs and a loose forward. Widdop and Lockers must play.

=cronk and Thurston showed up our poor halfback pairing.if the team could play for the full eighty and cut out schoolboy errors we could be in with a chance.ithought stevo and hemmings are bad on sky but ray"err"french and taffy davies need changing.

[phild1]

Game over 28 16

England have played well though

=could have been better,cutting out the daft mistakes would help.cant invite the aussies to play in our half not with the speed in the backs..

[Pharabus]

Did the UK coverage have Aussie commentators? here in Canada on Sportsnet the commentators where Aussie and what a breath of fresh air after the sky numpties!