England coach Tony Smith saw enough positives from the win against Wales to declare the game a success ahead of the Four Nations.
Smith satisfied with Four-Nations warm-up win in Wales
England coach Tony Smith saw enough positives from their warm-up win against Wales to declare the game a success ahead of his team's Four Nations campaign.
Smith's side emerged with a 48-12 victory at Bridgend, but it was not until the closing stages that they really put the Welsh to the sword.
Before that it was harder going at Brewery Field, where stand-off Sam Tomkins was the star of the show, scoring three of England's nine tries and being at the heart of all their creative play.
But Wales, crushed 74-0 by England in Doncaster last year, produced a hard-working display for new coach Iestyn Harris in his first game at the helm.
"It is no good when the scoreline goes one way and there is a total blow-out for one team - you don't learn as much about your defensive structure, for instance," said Smith.
Pleased
"We will get a lot out of that tonight. I am pleased with the hit-out. Some of our skills were a little off at times, as was some of our decision-making, but that is understandable when there are guys there who hadn't played for a while."
As for Tomkins' performance, Smith added: "His broken field play was very good, but I thought both half-backs (Tomkins and Richie Myler) did well. There were some good performances throughout, and I thought Sam Burgess was especially very good.
"I am pleased that we've been able to get some of the rustiness out and that we finished the game strongly. We scored some nice tries.
"We also got through it pretty well in terms of injuries, and I would be doubtful that we've got any concerns ahead of the games facing us."
Harris now takes Wales into a European Cup campaign that starts against Serbia next weekend, and on tonight's evidence, he certainly has some raw material to work with.
Encouraged
"I am really encouraged by it," he said. "We got a little bit tired towards the end, but I thought they went really well for a young group of players.
"When we got together on Monday they didn't have a lot of belief, but we gave them a game plan to enable them to have a real dip at England, and I thought the players really stood up tall.
"We knew what England were going to throw at us, someone like Sam Tomkins in full flow is a great sight to see, but for us it is important that we keep improving going through these next couple of games.
"We gave England a challenge, and I'm sure we have learned more from tonight than when we played them 12 months ago."
