RLWC2026 Semi Finals - Game Day Thread

[SteveTidball]

FINAL STANDINGS

Pool A

		P	W	L	+/-	Pts
	Australia	3	3	0	+76	6
	New Zealand	3	2	1	+142	4
	Fiji	3	1	2	-64	2
	Cook Islands	3	0	3	-154	0

Pool B/C

		P	W	L	+/-	Pts
	Tonga	3	3	0	+56	6
	Samoa	3	2	1	+130	4
	England	3	2	1	+86	4
	Papua New Guinea	3	1	2	-56	2
	Lebanon	3	1	2	-56	0
	France	3	0	3	-160	0

MATCHES

SEMI FINAL
Saturday 7th November 8:05pm
McDonald Jones Stadium

	New Zealand	34	v	10	Tonga

SEMI FINAL
Sunday 8th November 8:05pm
Allianz Stadium

	Australia	44	v	12	Samoa

[SteveTidball]

Should be some highly entertaining matches this week.

Tonga and Samoa put on a real show on the weekend but will have to work on their defence and ball control to have a real shot at toppling Australia and New Zealand.

Tonga (45 missed tackles, 19 errors) and Samoa (35 missed tackles, 15 errors) will struggle to keep up with such high defence and errors, the experience of the Australia and New Zealand will wear them out if they turn the ball over so often.

There is no doubt over their passion, but passion only gets you so far.

[HillsPanther]

How does Walsh get the nod over Tedesco? While Tedesco is not the best in the defence, he is far better than Walsh. The Hammer is going to run rings around Walsh.

[HillsPanther]

I haven’t seen the whole game, as I am overseas. But from the highlights it looks like the rest of the team made Walsh look good. This is despite him letting in a couple of soft tries.