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Opinion
Apparently there has been a lot written and said about how Daly Cherry-Evans went in our World Cup opener.
From the coaching staff’s point of view, we thought he was like the whole team – there was plenty to like and a few things that could have been done better.
The 17 players did the job in our strong win over Fiji and have thrown down the gauntlet to the other guys in the team who will get their chance when we take on Scotland on Friday night.
There’s still a bunch of positions up for grabs and Mal Meninga doesn’t intend settling on our best line-up until we reach the quarter-finals.
There is a bit of pressure on blokes to perform and that’s what they’ve got to do if they want to be in the team come the elimination stage.
(Photo by Brendon Thorne/Getty Images)
I always go back to my old Canterbury coach Warren Ryan’s quote at times like this that the players pick the team by virtue of the way they play.
Nathan Cleary will get his chance at halfback against the Scots and it’ll be up to him, the other Penrith boys in Liam Martin and Isaah Yeo, Lindsay Collins, Reagan Campbell-Gillard, Campbell Graham and Matt Burton to put their best foot forward to prove they deserve to be in the side for the elimination stage.
That’s how it’s always been with the Australian team and it’s one of the many reasons why it’s great that we’ve got someone at the helm like Mal who has been on so many tours like this one as a player and coach.
He knows you have got a long time away together and you’ve got to find the motivation for every squad member whether they’re an established Test player like our captain James Tedesco or a tour rookie.
A few of the guys who will run out this week haven’t played much footy recently, especially Collins with this being his first match after his suspension at the end of the regular season with the Roosters.
It will take the team a while to get combinations perfected and that’s what we saw last weekend.
Everyone will get a game or two in the three group games and from there we will know who is in our best 17.
I thought DCE had a strong game in defence against Fiji, he did a few extra efforts that went unnoticed, his talk was great and his attack was good apart from an early stray pass and a kick he didn’t nail late in the game.
(Photo by Jan Kruger/Getty Images for RLWC)
The longer the game went on, the better he got and that was the case for the majority of the side. It was a shaky start conceding the first try but the feeling within the squad was that it was a good way to kick off our campaign.
We defended strongly as a team against their big guns Viliame Kikau, Maika Sivo and Api Koroisau, and their young fullback from Penrith, Sunia Turuva, has a big future but we did well to keep him quiet for the most part.
The attack was not as fluent as we would have liked so that’s an area where we have to be a bit more patient because a lot of the guys were probably a bit too excited with the emotion of playing in a Test.
But there were a bunch of guys who enhanced their chances of making the 17 when it comes to crunch time – Angus Crichton, Pat Carrigan, Cam Murray, Harry Grant and Jake Trbojevic were really good in the forwards. Harry got the players’ player in his debut and his combination with Ben Hunt is second to none.
Jack Wighton is not out of the conversation for a spot in the starting side or the interchange based on his effort off the bench.
Josh Addo-Carr and Latrell Mitchell combined well on the left edge and Jeremiah Nania, Val Holmes and Murray Taulagi played well together on the right edge for the first time and did everything that was asked of them.
It was surprising Addo-Carr was overlooked for Origin this year by NSW, to be honest. The Foxx not only has great speed but he’s strong in defence and has a positive influence over the other team.
You need someone who’s going to keep the fun going and he is a great character.
(Photo by Jan Kruger/Getty Images for RLWC)
It’s been a pretty enjoyable first couple of weeks over here.
The north of England is buzzing with the World Cup being on and it didn’t hurt that the home side had a massive win over Samoa in the first match with 50,000 there at St James’ Park in Newcastle.
England were very impressive with George Williams finding form, Sam Tomkins at fullback and their five-eighth, Jack Welsby, he looks a likely lad. And Victor Radley at lock gives their pack extra steel, he was probably their best player.
There haven’t been too many calamities just yet apart from the opening ceremony mishap and a few injuries to the Samoan boys.
A couple of games you’re going to expect the result to go one way no matter what but some of the lower-rated teams like Lebanon, France and Italy are showing they’re not going to be pushovers.
Kangaroos team to play Scotland
1 James Tedesco (captain)
19 Campbell Graham
12 Matt Burton
10 Jack Wighton
9 Josh Addo-Carr
7 Cameron Munster
14 Nathan Cleary
6 Reagan Campbell-Gillard
3 Ben Hunt
13 Patrick Carrigan
17 Angus Crichton
21 Liam Martin
24 Isaah Yeo
Interchange
4 Valentine Holmes
5 Jake Trbojevic
20 Harry Grant
15 Lindsay Collins
Reserves
22 Jeremiah Nanai
2 Daly Cherry-Evans
Not playing: 11 Cameron Murray, 16 Reuben Cotter, 18 Tino Fa’asuamaleaui, 8 Latrell Mitchell, 23 Murray Taulagi
Michael Hagan is a former dual-premiership winning first grade player and current assistant coach of Australia's Kangaroos team. Hagan played 183 games for Canterbury and Newcastle and represented Queensland five times. He transitioned into a successful coach and took the Knights to a premiership in his first year in charge back in 2001. He went onto coach 205 NRL games and six times for Queensland in Origin.