Rugby League World Cup: England switch focus to winner-takes-all clash with Samoa after being ‘blown away’ by Australia

Rugby League World Cup: England switch focus to winner-takes-all clash with Samoa after being ‘blown away’ by Australia | Rugby League News

October 26, 2026:

Rugby League World Cup: England switch focus to winner-takes-all clash with Samoa after being ‘blown away’ by Australia | Rugby League News

England head coach Stuart Barrow insists his side remain positive of reaching the Women’s Rugby League World Cup semi-finals, despite being ‘blown away’ in a 78-0 drubbing by Australia on Saturday.

Nineteen months on from a humbling 90-4 loss to Australia in Las Vegas, England suffered another heavy defeat against the same opposition after the Jillaroos ran in 15 tries during a one-sided contest.

England now travel from Perth to Wollongong for Friday’s winner-takes-all clash with Samoa (6.45am GMT), where a victory is required to finish second in Group A and reach the knockout stages.

“There are some people in the group who were at Vegas and they’re in the changing room saying ‘this wasn’t like Vegas, it doesn’t feel like Vegas, you’re not part of what happened at Vegas – this is different’,” Barrow told reporters.

“Yeah, we didn’t help ourselves and the scoreline’s still big, but I think people have still got some positivity in there and people don’t want to go home. They want to have this game against Samoa and give our best.”

Barrow added: “We had to change the way we were going as a group [after Vegas] and we made a lot of changes to bring a young group in. This young group is going to develop and keep developing, and that’s a good learning curve from tonight.”

Jaime Chapman scored two tries in the opening six minutes for Australia, who were already 36-0 up at half-time, although Barrow was pleased with the commitment of his young England side.

“I thought we fought really well for the whole 70 minutes, and that may sound a little bit silly when you’ve conceded that many points, but it felt different,” Barrow explained. “I thought we competed, but we got beat by a far better team with just too much quality.

“It’s really disappointing when you see a score like that. You can’t be happy with it in any way, shape or form, but it felt different. It felt like we competed a lot more on plays.

“I don’t think we give up, I thought we just kept trying, but once they get a roll on like that, I don’t think any team in the world can compete with them. They’re just too quick, they’re too skilful, and they’re too fast for our girls at that stage.”

England had started the tournament strongly and showed encouraging signs during their 70-6 win over Wales, with Burrow keen to take attributes from that victory into the must-win Samoa clash.

“We’ve talked in there (changing room) about what we’ve been doing really well in training and what we did in patches last week against Wales – we can’t forget that because of this (loss), we’ve got to remember some of that stuff,” Burrow insisted.

“I think it was important that we talked in there about our effort areas and how we continue to turn up for each other, and that’s going to stand us in good stead in the future.

“Listen, we got blown away by an excellent team. A team I think is, probably, one of the best sporting teams in the world across all sports at the moment. They’re dominant and you want to go in there and you want to compete with them.

“We tried at certain areas, but eventually they were just too good and too strong. We’ve got to stick to our processes, get back on the horse and get ready for another game next week.”

What’s next?

England play Samoa in their final pool fixture on Friday (6.45am), where victory in Wollongong will secure a semi-final place. The winner will then play the team finishing top of Pool B in the opening semi-final, taking place in Newcastle on November 7.

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