All you egg chasers have far more in depth tactical Knowledge than me, I am a football player that occasionally plays rugby, knows the rules, and can have a good game at second row.

However all the flack Lancaster is getting seems a bit unfair.

Look at it from a football view point and you may get what I'm saying, Pardew makes some iffy subs at times (Mutch for Wilf, leaving Jedi out, playing Yannick up top instead of Gayle etc etc. And yet Pards get no s*** what so ever, because in the main he has been brilliant for Palace.

In the main Lancaster has been brilliant for England, I know the subs he made were "odd" but he must've done it for a reason, if I remember rightly Wales had already started turning the screw before he made the changes.

As for the Kick at goal that never was to suggest that is Lancasters fault is plain daft, he was miles away in seats, Rob Shaw was on the pitch and it was his choice, at that minute in time it was his choice, he needed to make a comand decision and he f***ed it up.

He kicks for goal, we maybe get three points but whatever the Welsh have to kick back to us and a draw was a very likely result with that much time left.

You can prepare the players as best you can, but when they cross the line of chalk you can do no more, look at that dick that took the penalty from Gareth Barry and then smashed it at the keeper ?

I know there was more to the game and Englands failure than one descion by Rob Shaw, but that was the catalyst for Wales to win. Do you really think Lancasters advice with minutes left on the clock, with a kickable penalty, level on points, would be to go for a set peice ?????? I think not

The Captain has to take this one.

I think what seems increasingly clear isn't that Burgess shouldn't have been in the team on Saturday but that he shouldn't have been in the squad. The plain truth is, based on the past four years, Burrell and Joseph should have been the starting pair for the RWC, with Burrell and Slade once Joseph got injured. How Burrell, who has given Wales a handful more than once lately, was simply dropped altogether for no apparent reason for someone who's not even a rugby (Union) player really beggars belief.

I can think of only two reasons. First, Bomber is plain and simple incompetent (or once again he let Farrell over-ride him, which is another form of incompetent) or second, the RFU men who picked up the tab for Burgess' transfer from League simply told Lancaster to put him in the squad to save face. The latter seems to me both harder to believe and more likely.

Even so, even if the latter was the case, Bomber should have played him in his club position (or, better yet, had him in the squad but not played him at all). It is seriously hard to believe any rugby professional on any level would have thought playing him at 12 was sensible. England were effectively playing with 14 men.

While the point about "chin up and get behind the team" is well taken, this really has been a disastrous campaign so far and we are far, far short of the mark. I hope somehow things turn around, but the truth is that it is very hard to see how they will. Ultimately, we lost on Saturday because we aren't very good right now. We're missing key players (Hartley, Joseph, Tuilagi) that we can't afford to miss and the drop off in quality to their replacements shows only how little real depth we have, compounded by a coach who makes poor selections.

Our lineout is dysfunctional with our best hooker (and arguably most influential player, Hartley) suspended (although he's not suspended anymore. He could be called up.) We are starting a hard-working but truthfully very average lock (Parling) solely because he can call line-outs and Lancaster doesn't trust anyone else to do the job. Despite this, our lineouts have been a disaster area. We don't have an openside; possibly the most important position in the modern game other than out-half. Any way you cut it. both Wood and Robs***e are blindsides by training and either pales by comparison with McCaw, Pocock, etc.

We have a very promising 10 but he is inexperienced and we don't play him in big games anyway. We don't have a 12 at all (the less said about Barritt the better) and our strength -- the back 3 -- rarely see the ball because our midfield isn't creative. Grunt is not going to win in the modern game.

If I am honest, I expect Australia to beat us, probably more easily than Wales did, on Saturday night. I desperately hope I'm wrong but their tight five is vastly improved over previous versions, their flankers are world class, and in the back division they are spoiled for choice. The best thing you can say about English rugby right now is we have a very, very good generation coming through. We might win the World Cup...in Japan next time around.

My fear for Saturday is that Lancaster is going to go even further into his shell, draw the predictable but wrong conclusion that the game will be won up front (thereby underestimating the Australian pack) and go back to route one in the backs. I don't think that will work. For me, he has to start Ford and Slade, he's got to get Wigglesworth a long way from the bench and he has to go down playing rugby. I think we play to our potential -- which still might not be enough to win -- then we can give Australia a game and have at least a shot. If we set up like we did against Wales, it will not only be over but ugly.

Anyway....... come on Fiji..... punch above your weight and help us today against Wales.....