England taught a lesson by Australia in Four Nations
England just have one game remaining to make sure they don’t leave the Four Nations with the dreaded wooden spoon tag. Sunday morning’s 34-14 defeat to Australia was Steve McNamara’s side’ second defeat on the spin and they now go into next weekend’s game against minnows Papa New Guinea knowing a defeat is not an option.
England were once again incredibly poor in the first half, slipping to 26-8 deficit at the break. Sam Burgess had given the visitors a surprise early lead but their early pressure faded as handling mistakes in the wet conditions presented their opponents with opportunities, which they duly took. Darrell Goulding and Tom Briscoe were the main handling culprits, both making unforced errors at crucial stages of the game which handed the initiative back to the hosts.
England improved slightly in the second period but Australia were always in control of the game and ran in two more tries to seal the victory. The error-prone visitors did have opportunities to add to their score, thanks to some inspired half-back play by debutant Ben Westwood, but a brilliant Australia defence kept them at bay.
Coach McNamara was rightly disappointed in the aftermath, but felt sure his young side would learn a lot from the experience.
“We came here with the sole intention of winning this competition, but it's also about making ourselves stronger for the future," McNamara told the BBC.
"This team has an average age of 24, the captain [James Graham] is only 25, the other starting frontrower [Sam Burgess] is only 21 and the outside backs probably only have 10 caps between them.
"I certainly think we've made some strides forward in this tournament.
"Physically our forwards, our middle, were outstanding in what they did, I thought there was a whole lot of effort in terms of that.
"There was some frustration from some of our players because some know they can perform a little bit better than what they did on occasion there.”
The win for the Aussies mean they go onto play New Zealand, who demolished Papa New Guinea 76-12, in next weekend’s final. England need to win, and win well next weekend, otherwise there could be some tough questions for McNamara to answer when he returns.
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