BBC SPORT | Rugby League | Sculthorpe: No excuses



By Paul Sculthorpe Great Britain star and BBC Sport Online columnist

There is a massive sense of disappointment at what happened in Sydney because we were the authors of our own downfall.

We just did not perform. It was not through lack of preparation. That is no excuse and no-one is putting our defeat down to that.

The lads were all up for it before we left Britain and once we got here everyone was keyed up for the game.

We just did not play well and you cannot afford to do that against a quality side like Australia.

It would have to be one of the biggest disappointments I have ever had on a rugby field

Paul Sculthorpe

If you do not do the basics you get smacked, and that is what happened.

They got a roll on and it told. We were never able to stop their forwards and their offloads.

We competed for 20 minutes but once they got on a roll they killed us out wide.

We stuck at it but by the time we did score early in the second half it was too late.

Two British players try to stop Australian hooker Danny Buderus
Britain were forced to defend for most of the game

We said at half-time that we needed to stop them at the rucks and slow their momentum down.

But we just could not hold them for long enough to get our hands on the ball and get much going ourselves.

To make matters worse, we lost Kris Radlinski and Keiron Cunningham at half-time, and we were already chasing the game.

When we got back to holding the ball we pulled a couple of tries back, but we just did not do it for long enough.

It would have to be one of the biggest disappointments I have ever had on a rugby field.

It is certainly going to be a long flight home.


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