First of all I’m no Hampshire groupie, the lad still has a lot to prove and is still some way off the finished article as a HB.

That said it tells you all you need to know about the British game and it’s three sad obsessions - over reliance on imported pivot players - not playing players in position - an absurd obsession with a players club shirt at international level.

It baffles me how Williams gets selected at that level it really does? If he wore almost any other shirt he would not get a sniff! He’s been barely adequate at club level in recent years.

I don’t think Hampshire has helped himself tbh but of the two imho he has far more of a game than Williams.

Yet he’s never really been given a run at 7 not even at Leigh due partly with our third obsession which is to play any young British HB at either FB or hooker.

This is nearly always done to accommodate an Aussie and quite often a second rate one. Even Miller who I like is I get the feeling bulletproof these days and no matter how well Hampshire or even Reynolds do Milky will be first on the team sheet - not Millers fault by the way.

We are far from the worst for this as it happens in every club in the land. Tomkins is a far better HB than Williams and Most of Wigan’s imports yet he’s only being used as a HB now after years of being wasted at FB - years he could have spent perfecting his game. Much to my surprise he’s been great this test series but it’s too little too late as his top years are gone.

Now the new obsession is Hastings! Seriously is that how low we have gone. Great player but he’s not British end of.

Put simply we need to start persisting with British HB’s at every club. Bring back A teams and let them learn until they are ready 22-24 year old is an ideal stage to step up to first choice HB.

We won’t beat the Aussies until we match them in brain as well as brawn and that won’t happen until we stop looking for quick fixes and develop players properly.

So back to my original point - Hampshire v Williams. Hampshire needs to buckle down now and stop listening to anyone except his Coach and maybe one day he’ll wear the England 6 or 7. Williams needs to be ignored until he learns how to truly play the game.
Both players have clearly been mismanaged through the years but it strikes me as odd that the clearly more talented of the two is still a million miles from international level. Whilst the other who is equally as far off gets picked without question. And finally both will spend most of their club career as second fiddle to Antipodeans of dubious quality and this will be mirrored throughout SL.

Very very sad situation that was so glaringly exposed today - if that had been Australia it would have been a series white wash to them and a third test drubbing of 50 points plus.

Had this debate all too many times, I don't rate Williams at all. I'm not sure if anyone else heard but he dabbed a kick into the in goal area yesterday and one of the commentators labelled him as having the best kicking game in Super League.

It's embarrassing.

We have better available and you're completely right with "an absurd obsession with a players club shirt at international level." I think there are a few others who shouldn't be playing for England yet continue to get the call up because of who they play for.

Vasty I agree with all you say, unfortunately there are posters on here already putting Hampshire at FB for the coming season (not me, I like him at SH) so if that comes off it will be yet another example of what you are highlighting.

Yet Williams has won the shield with England and the super League trophy with Wigan this year baffling isn't it

Not really sure why the rolling eyes were needed but hey - club level and international are different.

My point wasn't so much at Williams as a player though I don't think he is up to it as was shown yesterday in a huge way, as it was with Myler. It's to do with the lack of options and chances for young British half backs. This ends up with a past it Myler and a not good enough Williams being all we had. If we are to beat the Aussies ever let alone in a test series we cant go on like this IMO.

The main reason for using Hampshire as an illustration is because he was Williams comtemorary at Wigan, was at one point considered the better of the two yet his career (partly his own fault I suspect) had stalled until last season.

The other reason I used these two is this - when you watch Hampshire despite him having some faults whenever he gets the ball you do feel he might do something special - and fairly often he does - do you ever get that with Williams? I don't yet that's what's needed at international level.

This I fear is where Bennetts big failing is, he creates a club culture within an international team but sometimes you need more than that and I don't think he has the flexibility to do it. Makinson will keep TJ out forever unless he's injured and Hall never regains form - the former I can accept as Makinson has earned it. However he will stick with Williams or Gayle forever IMO despite neither having the X factor. I accept for now there are few alternatives but there might be in a few years yet they won't get a sniff unless they wear a Saints or Wigan shirt as I'm convinced they are the only two teams that really register with Bennett.

Oh well we will see.

Williams isn't the first choice 6 and hasn't been for a while. Widdop and Brown have been ahead of him. Club and international are different, correct but Williams has just had success at both in the same year.

The squad is made up of players mostly from the top 3 teams this year and therefore, in theory, the top performers across the year. Wayne Bennett sits down and knowing that his first 2 choice stands offs were out is presented with George Williams who won the comp, has played with these guys before or Ryan Hampshire (who im not even sure plays at 6?) playing in a team which finished 7th after 23 rounds, who would you honestly pick, putting club allegiance aside? Williams has a raft of big game experience and Hampshire doesn't which counts for a lot. I will put it out there that if Hampshire was so regularly doing special things it would surely be reflected in stronger results?

For what it's worth I think England were beat down the middle yesterday. Cronk and Thurston would struggle to put their mark on it.

I generally agree with your point about getting more British halves playing for SL teams rather than Aussies, especially second rate ones.

What I would love to see though and it's a shame it's not happening next year, is a full England team with no injuries containing the likes of Sam Burgess, Widdop, Clarke, Roby, Watkins, and even Hall if he's playing well in the NRL up against the current Aussies, especially while they're in a period of transition. We'd have a very competitive pack with the 3 Burgess brothers, Thompson, Graham, Hil, Clarke, Roby, Whitehead & Bateman & I'd probably try to play Tomkins and Widdop in the halves, (Sam at SH and Widdop at SO) seen as they've shown their all-around game is better than the rest at this level. As for Fullback, putting to one side his sins for one minute, if Hardaker comes back and starts to perform for Wigan how we know he can he'll be up for that role come to the end of the season.

Tbh yesterday I thought we were always going to struggle once we lost George, Tomkins & Clarke, we just looked too lightweight in the pack especially when Burgess and Thompson both went off and that was what was behind our first two wins, a strong and big pack making big meters down the middle of the park. We were a bit lost in the halves without Tomkins especially with our overall kicking game and general guidance around the field. Also for me, Clarke at Hooker was much better than Hodgson and I think that showed yesterday especially when we had scoring chances, Hodgson's distribution isn't as good, he doesn't always make the right calls & he runs up too many blind alleys as well.
ATEOTD when we didn't convert our pressure into points and they did, our heads gradually went down and their confidence grew, especially in that second half.

I like Hampshire a lot but he hasn't done enough to be talked as an International yet.
I'm not sure about the overseas player stopping his development. Effectively Williams and Powell stopped his first team opportunities at Wigan and he chose to move on.

Williams looked great when he hit the first team but I think he suffers from the Wane style of play. But still he's playing regularly at half back for his club.

Richardson Gale Tomkins (maybe Lomax) and Widdop are all in front of him.

Sorry but Richardson is bang average at very best, if he gets anywhere near an England shirt we have massive problems.

Our halfback set up should be Gale and Widdop, Williams should be further down the list - maybe even playing for the Knights.

In fairness look at the knights squad, it's described as the following on Wikipedia - "The Knights play a key role in the development of emerging talent, allowing players to gain experience in an international environment and to compete for a place in the England first team."

Surely Sam Powell is no longer classed as emerging talent at 26? Jack Hughes? Oli Holmes?

I get you have to have some experience but I say if they're not pushing for the England first team then that's it, we have better players available to put in this squad who given 3-4 years in the Knights squad would be first team ready come 26/27.

And Brough has been light years in front of the lot of them for years.

Why Gale? He has been invisible every time he has played for England, he has done nothing... At least Williams is trying to make something happen with ball in hand. Aside from his kicking game (Which I realise is one of the key aspects of a halves game) I thought he was quite decent yesterday in a dreadful side.

Because we see what he does week in week out in SL where as Williams is bang average, yes Gale seems to go missing on the big stage and that is a massive factor but he's a damn sight better than Williams overall - Gale>Williams.

I disagree. He is full of potential with some flaws.
He ripped us apart in one of his first games.

For me he is the kind of player being talked about here. Needs development and game time. Sts did this where other teams have not. They will benefit from this in future.
Hampshire is the same for us. Needs to play to develop. Wane did this with Williams and chose not to with Hampshire.

Exactly the type of player who IMO should be in the Knights squad following on from my previous comment, after the season he had at his age; it would be criminal not to include him for international development.

No it would not be criminal at all, after an initial 10 or so decent games for Saints he has been absolutely dreadful, If you want a real opinion on him go and talk to the Saints fans that watch him week in week out and how they are calling for him to be dropped every week for Matty Smith last season!

Every one of our four halfback options in Brough, Miller, Hampshire and Reynolds are all better than Richardson, put any of them in the Saints side last season and they would do a better job than him.

Yourself and Poptart etc are blinded by the big St Helens lights, jumping on the sky brigade.

So on the one hand, we must develop young British SH's, to enable us to compete in future with the Aussies - but on the other hand, we advocate writing off a young British SH because after a blistering start, he faded a bit towards the end of his first full season in SL?

I admire your confidence - but your logic is faulty.

And FWIW, you're wrong - Richardson is super-talented HB, who'll be in and around SL for years to come; and I'm certain he'll play for England in the future - as he gets experience, becomes a bit more physically robust and learns to pace himself over a season, he'll only get better.

It wasn`t towards the back end of last season though was it? Saints fans were calling for his head from about round 9 of last season, if you go back that far on there independent forum there up in arms, even though they were still blowing every team of the park at that point - What does that tell you?

Offer me Richardson over Hampshire tomorrow and I would tell you where to go, that is my honest opinion. Unlike many I can see what a player brings to a team, I can see a good player in a poor team and I can see a poor player in an outstanding team and I saw right from the off at the back end of last season with Richardson, he might show the odd piece of skill but he will never make a top half back for me.

FWIW I think you are wrong.

Well I mean I guess if you can prove your point correct then fair enough but I'd say Saints fans seemed happy with Richardson after he orchestrated each game to ensure they won the league. I'd also side with Justin Holbrook over yourself.

We coulkd bring in a ruling allowing only one overseas pivot per playing side in SL, which would mean that every side would have to have 3 British (or French for Catalan) pivots in every side.
This way it would focus clubs to work much harder to develop British creative players.
Sure, the quality would reduce in the short term but, the British game has utterly ignored this area for the last 40 years and because a 2/3 choice Aussie is plenty good enough to steer a SL sides around the pitch, most clubs continue to go for the easy option rather than put the time and effort into developing their own.
This leads us nicely into the Williams situation.
So short are we on British pivots that as soon as anyone has a half decent run of games, they are talked about and/or picked for England.
Having said that, Williams wasn't to blame for yesterdays debacle, it was our lack of grunt up front.
I wonder, if the series had been level, would we have tried to bring a couple of different players in or, were changes in either squad not allowed ?

this is an interesting debate.

I have skipped through all the posts and I did not see any reference to Myler the current England Half. Surely there must be someone out there who rates him or are you all of the same opinion as me, in that he is garbage.

Very very overrated

Fully agree ref Williams if he played for Trinity or Hull KR etc he would get nowhere near the international team
Having said that we are 22 years into SL and at times the SL closed shop.
I cant name one British international world class stand off or scrum half and the blame for this lies with every club and every coaching set up in SL.
While ever clubs take the quick fix and sign overseas players be it they are up and coming or past their best and fail to bring young British talent through by giving them game time nothing will change and we will never match the Aussies.

Yesterday our lack of depth in all areas was ruthlessly exposed. Having said that I will take a series win over NZ.
Makinson had an excellent series that said is he really better than Johnstone for my money no and when he made the break in the first half and got caught nobody on that field would have got Johnstone after that break.

For me the last of the great half back combinations was Rob Burrow/Danny McGuire sadly no club is producing these players anymore.
We have coaches coaching error free RL complete sets make the hard yards and build pressure often boring predictable robotic rubbish this is not the game I once knew.

Or you could take the view that the lack of grunt up front was caused by the appalling kicking game displayed by both halves and especially the hooker and the dreadful last tackle options. Much of this game was reminiscent of watching Trinity over the years when many have complained about our lack of fitness when in reality the problem has been our halves' inability to control a game from halfback.

This would be my concern before Williams but hopefully after yesterday's showing from Myler, his international career is over.
On Richardson, he's a good player but a penalty milking grub.