England national rugby league team Totally Explained

Everything about The England National Rugby League Team totally explained

The England national rugby league team represent England in international rugby league tournaments. The team has now seen a revival, having largely formed from the Great Britain team, who also represented Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The team is run under the auspices of the Rugby Football League.
   From 2008 the team will participate in all World Cup's, Tri-Nations's, and test matches. Previously, England were only separate from the other Celtic Nations for the World Cup. Their first appearance in this competition was in 1975, and since then they've become runners-up in 1975 and 1995, the latter tournament being held in England. In 2008 that'll compete in the 2008 World Cup in Australia. For many years England also competed in the European Nations Cup and in 2006, the Federation Cup. In the past England's main rivals have been Wales and France, with the rivalry stretching back to 1908 and 1934 respectively. However now England's main rivals would be Australia, New Zealand and to a lesser extent, France.
   Traditionally a predominantly white kit is worn containing white shorts and socks. However the shirt usually contains some form of red, like red strips, crosses or chevrons. Recently, the players number on the back of the shirt has also been red. These colours are similar to other English sporting teams and are the colours used on the national flag.
   Currently the team are ranked third in the world, behind Australia and New Zealand. But they're ranked first in Europe, ahead of France and Ireland. Australian Tony Smith, who has since taken out British citizenship, became the new head coach in 2007 and Jamie Peacock is captain, having played for England since 2000.

History

On the 5th April 1904, England versus 'Other Nationalities' (Welsh & Scottish), played a 12-a-side match at Wigan, which England lost 9-3. This was the first international match to feature England, and over the years that followed they'd regularly play touring teams from the Southern Hemisphere.
   England played at the World Cup in 1975, which was played over several months in both hemispheres on a league basis. They won one match and drew the other of their two games against eventual winners Australia. Due to England's defeat by Wales in their final match, Australia took the trophy, finishing one point ahead of England.
   In the 1995 World Cup England were coached by Phil Larder. The Lions got off to a flying start beating Australia 20-16 in the opening game at Wembley, then hammering Fiji and South Africa in the remaining group games to finish top of group A. This set up a semi-final game at Old Trafford against Wales. England won the tussle 25-10 to reach the World Cup final, but they lost 16-8 to Australia at Wembley Stadium. John Kear was coach of England for the World Cup in 2000. Compared to 1995, England had little success, losing their opening game at Twickenham 22-2 against Australia. But they won their remaining two pool games against Fiji and Russia. A surprising display by Ireland in the quarter-finals, saw England scrape through to the semi-finals 26-16. England then lost 49-6 to New Zealand at Bolton and were knocked out of the tournament.
   In October 1999, England met France in Carcassonne. The England team were without players involved with Great Britain, who were in Queensland for the Tri-Nations competition. The French fielded an experienced and talented squad but in the end England narrowly won 28-20.
   In 2002 England toured Fiji and Tonga. Karl Harrison became England coach in July 2004 replacing John Kear. He led England to European Nations Cup success in 2004 and coached them to a win over France and a narrow defeat by New Zealand in 2005. Harrison stepped down, citing family reasons in August 2006 and was replaced by Paul Cullen. England took part in the Federation Shield in the Autumn 2006, which they won.

Badge

The Lions Crest

The badge was originally a combination of the St. George's cross, the Three Lions Coat of Arms of England and Tudor Rose. It was similar to most other English sporting badges, such as the England national football team, England national rugby union team and the English national cricket team which all promote similar attributes.

The Shield Crest

The new official logo was launched on the 6th of February 2008 on the rugby league magazine programme Boots N' All. The cross of St George is positioned across a three-dimensional shield within the design. The date "1895" is placed through the centre of the cross, symbolizing the birth of rugby league. Many people involved in the sport were consulted throughout the design process, which took a little under a year. The logo will be used for the 2008 World Cup and many future events and tournaments.

2008

From 2008 onwards, the England team will compete in all World Cups, international tournaments and Test series. This is instead of playing as Great Britain. This will support the RFL’s strategy for the growth and development of the sport in this country and throughout Europe. The separation of Great Britain will also create an important opportunity for the Celtic Nations to drive the growth of the game in their territories.

Fixtures

Date	Team	Venue	Competition
28th June	France	Toulouse	Test
11th October	Ireland	TBC	Friendly
25th October	Papua New Guinea	Townsville	World Cup
2nd November	Australia	Melbourne	World Cup
8th November	New Zealand	Newcastle	World Cup

Squad

Possible 2008 World Cup Squad

As of 17 November, 2007

Number	Name	DOB	Position	Club	Test Caps (points)
1	Paul Wellens	February 27, 1980	Full Back	St Helens	1 (4)
2	David Hodgson	August 8, 1981	Winger	Huddersfield Giants	0 (0)
3	Chev Walker	October 10, 1982	Centre	Hull Kingston Rovers	6 (0)
4	Martin Gleeson	May 28, 1980	Centre	Warrington Wolves	? (?)
5	Gareth Raynor	February 24, 1978	Wing	Hull FC	? (?)
6	Danny McGuire	December 6, 1982	Stand-off	Leeds Rhinos	8 (12)
7	Rob Burrow	Sept 26, 1982	Scrum-half	Leeds Rhinos	4 (26)
8	Adrian Morley	May 10, 1977	Second Row	Warrington Wolves	26 (12)
9	Terry Newton	November 7, 1978	Hooker	Bradford Bulls	14 (28)
10	Jamie Peacock	December 14, 1977	Prop	Leeds Rhinos	12 (0)
11	Jon Wilkin	November 1, 1983	Second-row	St Helens	2 (0)
12	Gareth Ellis	May 3, 1981	Second-row	Leeds Rhinos	11 (4)
13	Stephen Wild	April 26, 1980	Loose Forward	Huddersfield Giants	0 (0)
14	James Roby	November 22, 1985	Hooker	St Helens	3 (0)
15	Sam Burgess	December 14, 1988	Prop	Bradford Bulls	0 (0)
16	Kevin Sinfield	Sept 12, 1980	Looose Forward	Leeds Rhinos	12 (0)
17	James Graham	Sept 10,1985	Prop	St Helens	1 (8)
18	Paul Cooke	April 17, 1981	Stand Off	Hull Kingston Rovers	3 (?)
19	Kirk Yeaman	Sept 15, 1983	Centre	Hull FC	5 (4)
20	Sean O'Loughlin	November 24, 1982	Loose Forward	Wigan Warriors	7 (8)
21	Leon Pryce	October 9, 1981	Stand Off	St Helens	11 (30)
22	Ade Gardner	June 26, 1983	Winger	St Helens	1 (4)
23	Maurie Fa'asavalu	Sept 12, 1980	Prop	St Helens	0 (0)
24	Jamie Jones-Buchanan	Sept 12, 1980	Loose Forward	Leeds Rhinos	12 (0)

Statistics

Rankings

World Ranking: 3rd (2007)
European Ranking: 1st (2008)

Team

Highest score: 76-4 v Russia at St Helens (World Cup), 1 November 2000

Widest winning margin: 76-4 v Russia at St Helens (World Cup), 1 November 2000

Highest against: 49-6 v New Zealand at Bolton (World Cup), 18 November 2000

Highest losing margin: 49-6 v New Zealand at Bolton (World Cup), 18 November 2000

Individual

Most tries in a match: 4 by Jim Leytham (Wigan) v Other Nationalities at Bradford, 2 January 1905, Stan Moorhouse (Huddersfield) v Wales at Plymouth, 15 February 1913, Peter Norburn (Swinton) v Other Nationalities at Wigan, 28 November 1953, Keith Fielding (Salford) v France at Bordeaux, 11 October 1975, Stuart Wright (Widnes) v Wales at St. Helens, 28 May 1978, Martin Offiah (Wigan) v France at Gateshead, 12 June 1996

Most goals in a match: 9 by Geoff Pimblett (St. Helens) v Wales at St. Helens, 28 May 1978, Andrew Farrell (Wigan) v Fiji (World Cup) at Leeds, 4 November 2000

Most points in a match: 22 (2t, 7g) by Steve Prescott (St. Helens) v France at Gateshead, 12 June 1996, (1t, 9g) by Andrew Farrell (Wigan) v Fiji (World Cup) at Leeds, 4 November 2000

Other

Biggest home attendance: 66,000 v Australia at Wembley (World Cup Final), 28 October 1995

Record

Overall

The first ever match for England was against a mixture of Welsh and Scottish players calling themselves the "Other Nationalities" in 1904. This match was lost, but England won a year later against the same opposition. In 1908 England first played a touring team, New Zealand. The first match played out of England was a little later in 1908 in Tonypandy, Wales. But it wasn't until 1933 that England played any matches outside Great Britain, where they met Australia for the first time in Paris, France. Since that game, most matches played have been between Wales, France and Other Nationalities as England rarely played Australia and New Zealand before 1975. Also in 1975 they played Papua New Guinea for the first and only time so far. More recently in the 1995 and 2000 World Cup's, England has faced new opposition in teams like South Africa, Fiji and Ireland.

Against	Played	Won	Lost	Drawn	% Won
	60	42	16	2	70%
	37	28	7	2	75.6%
Other Nationalities	16	8	7	1	50%
	14	7	5	2	50%
	4	2	1	1	50%
	2	2	0	0	100%
	2	2	0	0	100%
	1	1	0	0	100%
	1	1	0	0	100%
	1	1	0	0	100%
	1	1	0	0	100%
	1	1	0	0	100%
Total	140	96	36	8	68.5%

Rugby League World Cup

Please note that before 1975, and after 1975 until 1995, Great Britain represented England as well as Scotland, Wales and Ireland, and so England didn't compete in those tournaments despite many players from those Great Britain teams being English. In 1975 Wales were considered to be good enough for their own team, and so Great Britain split into England and Wales for the competition. This is similar to the 1995 tournament and also the 2000 competition in which Ireland and Scotland also competed as well as England and Wales.

Year	Round	Position	Won	Drawn	Lost	Pts Scored	Pts Against
1975	No stages	2nd	5	2	1	167	84
1995	Final	2nd	4	0	1	145	42
2000	Semi-Final	3rd/4th	3	0	2	176	95
2008	-	-	-	-	-	-	-

Other England Teams

In addition to the England team, there has also been an England "Lionhearts" and England A team selected since 2002.

England A

The England A team is made up of selected players from the Super League, who are not yet ready for selection in the main England team. In 2003 and 2004, England A participated in the European Nations Cup.

England Lionhearts

England Lionhearts are selected from players in the Rugby League Conference. They compete against Wales A, Scotland A and Ireland A each year in the Amateur Four Nations competition. The Lionhearts played the Malta Knights, in what was the first ever rugby league game played in Malta, at the Marsa Stadium in October 2005. The Lionhearts lost 36-6. On May 6, 2006 the English Lionhearts played Serbia in Pancevo and won 50-4.

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