England get “reality check” as George Williams admits ‘we’re not as good as we thought we were’ following Ashes loss

England captain George Williams has admitted that his side are not as good as they thought they were after losing the rugby league Ashes.

In the second Test of the Ashes, England were defeated 14-4 by the Australians with Shaun Wane’s side dropping off once again in the second 40.

They trailed 8-0 at the break at Wembley before losing 26-6 and the story was the same at the Hill Dickinson Stadium, level 4-4 at the half before a slow start and two quickfire tries killed the game off.

On that, Williams admitted to the BBC: “I don’t think we started the second half well at all, the same as last week and then Australia scored two quick tries, and that’s pretty much the game.

“Then we’re chasing points, we’re very lateral, and our attack wasn’t very clinical at all, so I’m really disappointed.

“We’ve shown improvements in the first half, but not good enough at this level.”

George Williams gives honest review after Ashes loss

Williams rued the way his side attacked as they chased the game having conceded tries to Cameron Munster and Hudson Young, and the frustration of not replicating their first half performance in the second stanza.

A frustrated Williams said: “We know they’re such a good team and are hard to score against, and you’ve seen they defended us really well. I don’t think our shape was too effective at the end, we were tired bodies, we were just going through the motions with our shape, it wasn’t very direct, and then we were coming up with some bad skill at the end of it.

“A spirited performance but not good enough at this level.”

He added: “In the second half, once they got a roll on, we probably showed a bit too much respect. It was really disappointing.”

England are now tasked with avoiding a 3-0 series defeat, something George Williams admitted would be “embarrassing” as he again aired his frustrations at the fact England had not performed to their ability.

The Wire skipper said: “We’ve obviously spoken a lot about how we’ve improved and how we’re getting better, and we’re probably not seeing that. We’ve probably seen it for forty minutes, but we’re not seeing a full performance. That’s what we’ll be chasing.

“We’ve had enough sessions to get it working out on the field, and I don’t think we’ve quite done that.

“We’ve got loads to work on and we’re probably not as good as we thought we were heading into this series. It’s a good reality check for us and there’s loads to improve on.”

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