England hoped to be immersed in the excitement, hype and spotlight of a home World Cup final this week.
Instead, Shaun Wane’s squad are back home with hangovers, adverse headlines and the tortuous mental wrestle of what should have been.
With the women’s thrilling glory bid also ended by the force of New Zealand last night, Saturday’s double header under the Old Trafford lights will now be a tough watch rather than a glorious opportunity. All hopes instead rest on the wheelchair team on Friday night.
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The best part of a week has passed since the gut-wrenching men’s loss to Samoa in golden point extra time. And none of the pain has subsided.
For as inexplicably poor as England were in the biggest game of their World Cup, Wane’s side still should have rescued a win.
The drug of following England - as fan, journalist or both - during a tournament, is that you are sucked in to believe. And not at any point during their error-strewn semi-final performance did I genuinely feel they would lose. Until the drop goal went over, the clock stopped and the jubilant Samoan celebrations took over.
So instead of pride and joy we have another England post-mortem, with so many things to be questioned in the light that only hindsight and heartache can afford.
What happened?
England saved their worst performance for the biggest game. Samoa were fantastic, but still produced a number of errors themselves, which the hosts would usually have capitalised on to win the game. Even after clawing back a late deficit to send the game to sudden death, England had it in their hands, but produced as bad an extra period as you could have seen, with two huge unforced errors allowing Samoa the platform for a deserved and historic win.
Were England too fired up?
Shaun Wane’s mantra has always been heart on the sleeve, kiss the badge. A foundation of honest brutality and aggression, assembling a squad of warriors who would blast out the national anthem and then be willing to die for the cause on the pitch. They were fired up for this semi-final by a motivational speech from former Marine and SAS: Who Dares Wins presenter Ant Middleton.
From the moment the usually cucumber-cool rising star Jack Welsby went head-to-head with his opponents after the spine-tingling Samoan Siva Tau, you could see England wanted to win the game by winning the fight. For players like Chris Hill and Tom Burgess that is exactly what you want. For the likes of Welsby, Kallum Watkins and Dom Young it probably isn’t.
Samoa’s reaction to their opening-day defeat by England meanwhile was a Prayer Maker, who helped the players process and forget about the loss before they had even got back on the coach. They have since gone unbeaten to a first ever World Cup final.
Who is to say which philosophy is right, but ultimately with the game on the line under the most intense pressure, all the composure came from Samoa, as England’s trusted ice-in-the-veins leaders Sam Tomkins and Welsby came up with the two big mistakes. Were they too pumped up?
As the great snooker player Steve Davis once said, champions are those who play as if it means nothing, when it in fact means everything.
Were the selections right?
Another question we can only ponder with hindsight.
Young fully earned his place on the wing with a stunning tournament. But he and Watkins on the right struggled badly against Samoa on a day where Ryan Hall’s metres out of defence would have been a huge asset to a team under siege.
At hooker Michael McIlorum - a long-time ally of Wane - had no influence and was eventually replaced. Wane has preferred a big bench of forwards meaning no replacement hooker, and no chance for the livewire Andy Ackers to influence the game instead.
It meant an out of position Victor Radley, himself clearly not fit after an elbow injury suffered against Greece. Radley would throw the key interception pass for Stephen Crichton’s breakaway try.
Was it the wrong venue?
Probably a pointless question to ask, but the 40,000 inside Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium produced easily the flattest atmosphere for an England game this World Cup. Indeed England’s players only lifted when the crowd were sparked into life by the big second half melee triggered by Tomkins and Jarome Luai.
Rugby league will only grow through trying new things like this, but it is selfishly tempting to think what might have been for England if the tie had been played inside a raucous Elland Road.
What happened next?
Some pretty grim headlines that England could well have done without, involving an alleged drunken scrap between Radley and Ireland international James Bentley, with Wane apparently also present.
What Bentley was even doing there is one for him to explain, while the logic of having Samoa moving into the same hotel that England were vacating is clearly questionable too. The Australian media who have been following England for a Radley story in recent weeks suddenly got their wish.
An unfortunate end to a hugely positive tournament for an England side who wanted this so badly, but ultimately must come to terms with this being another glorious failure.
Was this a missed opportunity?
Undeniably so. Expectation, anticipation and belief was all huge.
The set-up could not have been better for home success - England could have lost their opening game and still made the final without having to play Australia and New Zealand.
What that would have done for rugby league in the UK we will not now know. But to say it represents a missed opportunity for the international game in general would be both short-sighted and massively unfair to Samoa.
Their emergence, along with the fast-improving Tonga and Papua New Guinea, is exactly what international rugby league needs to be taken seriously and something that this World Cup should be very proud of. The scenes of celebration in Samoa already have been utterly glorious.
Their head coach Matt Parish may not be making many friends with his somewhat discourteous approach to a rugby league media he appears to regard as an enemy, but his players are doing the opposite in inspiring genuine belief in a new era for the global game.
Seeing Samoa walking out for a World Cup final on Saturday will be a very special moment.
England’s women are processing the pain of falling short too, but they have made a massive impact in inspiring the next generation.
An emotional head coach Craig Richards now leaves his role after defeat to the Kiwi Ferns in the last four, but when the dust settles he and his players must surely see what a giant leap forward they have provided for the women’s game.
And so too the wheelchair team, who could join England’s Physical Disability side as world champions on Friday night against France.
Wheelchair rugby league has won an army of new fans with its ferocious power and speed, and this England team does still have the shot at glory that the women’s and men’s teams so craved.
*18+ | BeGambleAware | Odds Subject To Change
