AFTER a 22-year wait, I think it’s fair to say the 2025 Ashes Series left us all with more questions than answers.
Is Shaun Wane the right man to take England into the World Cup next year?
Where do England go from here after never really firing on all cylinders in any of the three tests?
Why is Australia so much more advanced in the game than we are?
Does the NRL need to invest in Super League in order to start reducing that gap?
Should Jake Connor have been selected?
All of these questions and more have been asked since the series ended in a 30-8 Australia win in front of a packed house at AMT Headingley on Saturday, 8th November.
No doubt the inquest has already begun at RFL headquarters, where some of these questions will be discussed, but if I tried to answer all of them here, I would need far more than this single page to do it.
However, some have been looked at in more depth elsewhere in this issue, with regular RLW writer Mick O’Hare taking a look at the series from a fan’s eye view, while we also assess the mood coming out of both camps in the aftermath of the three matches.
But one question I was left with was, should we be worried going into the World Cup? I don’t know about anyone else, but I am.
Let’s face it, despite their best efforts, Wane’s team never really got close to the Aussies in any of the three games – and that was against something of an understrength Australian side who were missing numerous big names across the field.
Despite the Aussies running away with a 3-0 whitewash, only three of their players earned selection into our International Team of the Month – this is revealed over the page, so I’ll not spoil it here by telling you who they are. But such was the strength of the Pacific Championships competition, Fiji, New Zealand, Cook Islands, Papua New Guinea and Samoa are also represented – a scenario that would almost have been unheard of even a few years ago given the Green and Golds’ dominance of the international game.
Isn’t it amazing what playing regular matches can do for sides?
Having started out as the Oceania Cup in 2019, the Pacific Championships returned in 2023 after an enforced three-year break due the Covid-19 Pandemic and the 2022 World Cup, and since then it has grown and grown and become a major part of the rugby league calendar in the southern hemisphere.
Those countries once considered as emerging nations are getting noticeably fitter, stronger, and more competitive – and for me, that is down to two interlinked reasons. One – these nations are now getting more opportunities to go up against the best, and the more you can do that as players, the more you’re going to improve – that’s a fact that is hard to deny. And two – because players know these nations are going to get more competitive games in a strong competition, more and more top players are opting to represent them – Payne Haas switching from Australia to represent Samoa this year is one example of this. Adding that sort of top-level experience to any side is, of course, always going to help their improvement as well.
We simply don’t have anything here to match that.
Many of these Pacific nations will join England in next year’s World Cup, and while in previous tournaments England would have been expected to beat them, this year’s international fixtures prove that may no longer be the case. Don’t forget we lost to Samoa is the semi-finals last time, now it could even take some effort to get to that stage this time around.
Ahead of the World Cup, whether that is under Wane or not, one thing that needs to happen is that England needs some warm-up games going into the tournament.
It was hugely evident throughout the Ashes just how little time this squad had had together before the first test kicked-off at Wembley. That was just two weeks after the Grand Final brought the curtain down on a season that didn’t allow for a mid-season test or even any time for Wane to work with the squad in camp.
Whether Wane is the right man to take the national side forward is probably the subject of a future editorial – but one thing is for sure – there is no point replacing him unless other wholesale changes are made. A change of coach would merely be scratching the surface of deeper issues.
Until the RFL shows some real leadership over the clubs and arranges a season that factors in time for international fixtures and time for the national squad to work together, very little is going to change, and any new coach would face similar challenges.
I know games against France might not be the most competitive or challenging right now, but at least if England had had a run-out against them before the Ashes, it would have given Wane’s squad a chance to work on some combinations and just get together as a squad, and see how each other play. At times they looked closer to strangers than team mates on the pitch.
France have two teams in Super League now so will improve over the next year or so, but they would also benefit from more games against the best players we have to offer – it’s a win-win solution – even if it takes a few years to come to full fruition.
Maybe that precious time together might have eliminated some of the simple errors England made against Australia – who knows – hindsight is a wonderful thing?
How does that old saying go? Fail to prepare, prepare to fail.
First published in Rugby League World magazine, Issue 515 (December 2025)
