{"id":742248,"date":"2026-06-17T11:38:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T11:38:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/742248\/"},"modified":"2026-06-17T11:38:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T11:38:11","slug":"more-nrl-stars-flip-allegiance-to-england-ahead-of-2026-rugby-league-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/742248\/","title":{"rendered":"More NRL stars flip allegiance to England ahead of 2026 Rugby League World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"

Recently appointed England rugby league coach Brian McDermott has named 11 NRL stars in a preliminary 38-man squad<\/a> for this year\u2019s Rugby league World Cup in Australia and PNG.<\/p>\n

In addition to established England representatives such as Herbie Farnworth, Dom Young, Kai Pearce-Paul, Victor Radley and AJ Brimson, potential debutants from the NRL include Canterbury Bulldogs<\/a> prop Max King, Canberra Raiders<\/a> hooker\u00a0Jayden Brailey, Sydney Roosters<\/a> centre Billy\u00a0Smith\u00a0and\u00a0Brisbane Broncos<\/a> prop Ben Talty.<\/p>\n

Three more NRL stars who could have technically been selected in the England spine were noticeable absentees: NSW\u2019s Ethan Strange and Blayke Brailey and Maroons halfback Sam Walker.<\/p>\n

On announcement of his squad, McDermott said he had enjoyed process of scouring Super League and the NRL for players who could potentially represent England on the world stage.<\/p>\n

MORE:\u00a0NRL 2026 Player Market – Every player off-contract, latest signing news<\/a><\/p>\n

Indeed, the former Newcastle Knights<\/a> assistant coach knows the NRL talent pool well, given he is currently working alongside Josh Hannay with the Gold Coast Titans<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is clear there is a raft of talent available at our disposal and\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0encouraging to see the sort of player who could be lining up for us in a few months\u2019 time,\u201d McDermott said.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the NRL,\u00a0there\u2019s\u00a0further players who\u00a0I have seen first-hand who are performing well and who have\u00a0expressed a desire to\u00a0represent\u00a0England\u00a0via\u00a0the\u00a0heritage\u00a0rule.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Rugby League World Cup begins in Perth on October 15 and ends with the Final exactly one month later at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane on November 15.<\/p>\n

England 38-man squad for 2026 Rugby League World Cup<\/p>\n

Junior Nsemba, Ethan Havard, Luke Thompson, Sam Walters, Brad O\u2019Neill, Jake Wardle, Harry Smith, Zach Eckersley (Wigan Warriors<\/a>), Kallum Watkins, Mikolaj Oledzki, Ash Handley, Jake Connor (Leeds Rhinos), Ben Currie, Danny Walker, George Williams, Matty Ashton (Warrington Wolves), Kai Pearce-Paul (Wests Tigers<\/a>), Dean Hadley, Jez Litten, Mikey Lewis (Hull KR), Morgan Smithies, Jayden Brailey (Canberra Raiders), Victor Radley, Billy Smith (Sydney Roosters), AJ Brimson (Gold Coast Titans), Jack Welsby, Alex Walmsley, Daryl Clark, Harry Robertson (St Helens), Morgan Knowles, Herbie Farnworth (Dolphins<\/a>), Mike McMeeken, Caleb Hamlin-Uele, Jake Trueman, Tom Johnstone (Wakefield), Max King (Canterbury Bulldogs), Ben Talty (Brisbane Broncos), Dominic Young (Newcastle Knights).\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Recently appointed England rugby league coach Brian McDermott has named 11 NRL stars in a preliminary 38-man squad…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":742249,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-742248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=742248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742248\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/742249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=742248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=742248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=742248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}