Tommy Makinson lashes out at the ‘failure’ of England’s RL World Cup

TOMMY Makinson has a bone to pick when critics squander England’s Rugby League World Cup campaign – although he concedes failing to reach the final was a “failure”.

Thursday, February 16 is the day national team coach Shaun Wane will learn his fate after a much-hyped tournament recap.

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Listen to a few and everything should be ripped. The game here isn’t good enough, the manager should be sacked, certain players shouldn’t be anywhere near a Test shirt yet.

The Rugby Football League review and board meeting on the opening day of the Super League season will change opinions after the 27-26 heartbreak in the overtime semi-final against Samoa, but former national team boss Tony Smith told SunSport he shouldn’t “go out.” “. City.’

And while St Helens winger Makinson – who set an international record with five tries in a 30-point victory in the hosts’ 46-6 win over Papua New Guinea in the quarter-finals – can understand why the campaign is being criticized, he would like to know why it is like that.

He said: “I find it disappointing to see, I would like to know why it is.

“I know the reasons why they say it’s a failure. Ultimately we failed, of course we did

“Our goal was to win a World Cup final in our own country. I can’t dispute the fact, but it’s the way it’s talked about.

“I can understand why people say that, but we played really well and in the group games we were great.

“Shaun made us play good rugby but as boys we just didn’t play Samoa in the semi-finals and that ultimately cost us.

“If you don’t perform, you don’t get to the big games and that’s how it was.

“We had a lot of chances in that game, we should have won – it’s one that I always look back on and think, ‘We should have been in the World Cup final.'”

After scoring just under 68 points at a World Cup, Makinson has set goals at home and abroad for 2023 – helping St Helens to a fifth straight Super League title and that tie on February 18 at Australian champions Penrith Club – to become world champion.

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All of this is fueled by the disappointment about the World Cup, as the 31-year-old adds: “From a personal point of view, it was really positive.

“The only thing I look back on with disappointment is the last game. We didn’t quite play the way we wanted, we didn’t play the way we imagined, which ultimately led to us not reaching the World Cup final.

“We thought, ‘We’re going to be there, we deserve to be there.’ That’s where we wanted to go and it was pretty hard to get over it.

“We had the chance to play against Australia, who weren’t great at the time. It’s disappointing, but you have to keep going.”