England through to Four Nations final with Australia.

England and Australia both qualified for the Four Nations final with successful defeats of both New Zealand and Australia respectivly.

France 4-42 Australia
Australia were pretty much assured of a final apperance despite having still not mathematically qualified beforehand. Only an enormous upset from the French and an unpredicted England win over New Zealand could have stopped them from appering at Leeds. But the Morris twins made sure Australia had the chance to avenge their world cup defeat with two tries apiece along with contributions from hat-traick hero Michael Jennings, and Penrith's Luke Lewis.
But Australia still failed to get out of second gear making their consistancy a real worry for Tim Sheens going into the final showdown. The French showed the same grit and determination they had displayed throughout this tournament in the first half, but eventually collapsing due to the fast paced nature of the Australian's, who lead only 8-0 at half time. It was arguably one of the worst Australian performances I have seen in the first fourty minutes despite the lack of big named Aussies in the starting seventeen.

It wasn't a full strength Australian side that stepped onto the field where Super League began all those years ago, but not many players would have made an impression on the coaching staff as Australia were allowed to be dominated by Bobbie Goulding's French side, who have clearly been given a new breath of fresh air by the former Great Britain scrum half after their dismal apperance in the world cup. France can look forward to a bright future with Goulding at the helm. He has installed some disipline and patriotism into the squad and they look like a future threat to any of the 'big three' in future years.

Australia meanwhile must live up to their pre-tournament hype and become the team that threatened to brush aside the competition.


England 20-12 New Zealand 
England were quite good against the current world champions.

Now there's a sentence I didn't think I would be writing this time last week. England looked like a side capable of actually competing with the best in the world. With Kevin Sinfield at hooker and the inclusion of both Peter Fox and Chris Bridge, they looked solid in defence and showed an attacking flair that had been missing up until that point. Even the troublesome half back combinations seemed to work in Sam Thomkins playing in his usual scrum half role, with the usually unimpressive Kyle Eastmond making an impressive performance.

In defence, England prevented New Zealand, and when I say New Zealand I mean Benji Marshall, from making as many yards and closed them down quickly when they looked like creating half a chance. Jamie Peacock still looked unimpressive out of position in the back row, but Morley, Burgess and Graham made up for him in the prop forwards.

England did exactly what they've been doing all tournament. They played no different to how they performed against Australia the week before in the second half, but this time it was done for 80 minutes and the tactics worked. This shows that England can win this tournament if they play in the same manner and style as they have done for the last 120 minutes of rugby.