Dom Young double fires England to opening World Cup rout of Samoa

Dom Young scored twice on his Test debut as England produced an outstanding team display to comfortably defeat Samoa in the opening game of the Rugby League World Cup. The bookies had Samoa as favourites given the quality of players Matt Parish has been able to call upon from the NRL. In contrast, little was made of England in the run-up to the tournament but the hosts were outstanding from start to finish.

This victory means Shaun Wane’s side are in pole position to finish top of Group A, whereas defeat would have likely consigned them to second and a tougher route to the final next month.

The day began with chaos as the opening ceremony had to be cut short when the public address system inside St James’ Park failed. It meant a delay to kick-off and a shortened pre-match set from the Kaiser Chiefs. Their lead singer, Ricky Wilson, tried his best to revive the crowd during the silence by running up and down the touchline, but the players soon took responsibility for the entertainment.

Having had to hear all week about how Samoa were favourites, England wasted little time in putting that theory to the test. A penalty from the boot of Tommy Makinson nudged them ahead before the outstanding half-back pairing of George Williams and Jack Welsby assumed complete control of the contest. A break from Williams teed up Welsby to score the first try of the World Cup and England began to motor through the gears.

By half-time they had scored two more tries and both came from Young. His first was a scintillating break from deep, round Samoa’s full-back, Joseph Suaali’i, and Welsby’s cut-out pass enabled the winger to finish in the corner for his second.

Samoa responded on the stroke of half-time with an Izack Tago interception, but