Ashes Rugby League: Error-prone England suffer ‘torture’ at Wembley

It’s never a good sign when a coach describes an international match involving his team as “torture”.

Shaun Wayne was clearly hurting after watching his England side suffer a comprehensive 26-6 defeat to Australia at Wembley in their first Ashes match in 22 years.

In fact, it could have been much worse. Australia started slowly and led by only eight points in the first half, but they excelled in the second half, while England wasted opportunities and committed simple errors.

Australia will retain the Ashes if they beat England at Liverpool’s Hill Dickinson Stadium next weekend – and they are not out of second gear yet.

“They are very disappointed in the dressing room,” Wayne said in his post-match press conference with his players. “I really wanted to see the best in our players, but we didn’t level ourselves today. This is torture for me.”

The gap in quality between the two sides was made clear by the first movements of the full-backs in the second half.

Rhys Walsh, who was player of the match, carried the ball 80 meters after England half-half Mickey Lewis slipped. While England resisted the initial momentum, the ground gained provided a platform for Australia to score the killer’s second try of the match.

“Rhys Walsh made two saves and scored two goals,” former England striker James Graham told BBC One. “Let’s not forget that break he made at the start of the second half, which set the tone.”

The try resulting from this break was scored by second row Angus Crichton, who evaded England full-back Jack Welsby to score.

Unlike the forward-thinking Walsh, Welsby was arrested. He backed away from Crichton until his heels were on the try line. When he made a limp attempt to tackle his leg, it was too late.

That’s what tortured Wayne the most – not being outdone by the world number one international team and the clear favorite of the series, but being outplayed.

He said: “I know what these players can do, but we did not give ourselves a chance to win.” “It’s very painful; we didn’t put in our best performance today. The mistakes we made are easy fixes.

“They outplayed us and outplayed us. It’s easy to fix but it has a knock-on effect. It was a simple game of rugby, and we didn’t get the details right.”