Australia 46 England 16 - Four Nations Final - Elland Road Leeds RLCM Report - RLCM - Australia beat England 46-16 on Saturday night to win the Gillette Four Nations title at Elland Road Stadium in Leeds.
Looking only at the score, one would think that Australia won the game easily - not so. The penalties to England during the first half gave them positive field position and kept the match interesting and close.
For about 60 minutes of the game this was a hard fought Test match with the score 22 to 16 in Australias favour.
From that point on, Australia ran in 24 unanswered points from the 18 Sets [Eng 7 sets, Aust 11 sets] that remained to once again become the leading nation in the game.
To their credit, England did lift their game and showed that with more experience at this level they are possibly not all that far away from matching it with the more experienced big match Australian players.
England will learn from this series and realize the effort that is needed to become a force in the world competition.
The two young lads at half and five-eight will learn and be better players after the experience but as coach, Tony Smith, said after the game, More halves of similar ilk are needed in the game in England to keep putting pressure on the existing players.
The big and strong Great Britain forwards showed they had aggression and ball playing skills but at times lacked the big game nous in attack and ruck defence.
The England defence appeared good but they were unable contain Australia in their half of the field whereas Australia was able to control the speed of Englands ruck and limit their forward movement.
During the first half, Australia was able to bring the ball back to or over the 50m mark for their kick on 10 of the 11 occasions after receiving the ball in their red zone.
So, in saying the England defence was good, it might be more correct to say the England defence was good on plays one and two of the Set.
However, Australia were able work over the markers and Englands D was broken down as the Set continued thus not allowing England any extended ruck domination.
England did look good in attack when they were in the Australian half of the field, but the majority of time they only got down there with the help of a penalty. They were unable to structure positive Sets of their own.
The Australian defence controlled their coming out Sets and had them struggling to get to their 50m after receiving the ball in their red zone.
It was a good game for the 31,042 fans to witness. The scores were close for 60 minutes and gave England hope. It was a thrilling game to watch up to that point.
But it also showed that England still has a way to go and needs a continuation of big match games to experience and learn from the pressure and structure of play that is needed to be competitive at the top level of the international game.
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6:04Tony Kempby rlcm57299 views
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