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\n England’s Robert Hawkins was a star on day one of the Wheelchair World Cup.
\n \u00a9Mark Nolan
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Ireland broke their international points record with their sterling 110-10 win over the USA, while England kept the wood on Wales 98-18 as the opening matches of the 2026 Wheelchair World Cup got underway in Wollongong\u2019s WIN Entertainment Stadium.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Emerald Isle\u2019s previous Test record was 92 points against Scotland last year, but they surpassed that easily today, with the result never looking in doubt after the opening exchanges.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ireland showed they are a renewed side since the 2022 World Cup on the back of winning the annual three-nation Celtic Cup (Ireland, Wales, Scotland) for the past three years.\u00a0<\/p>\n
England are the reigning World Cup champions and handed the Welsh a heavy 122-22 defeat in the semi-finals of the 2022 tournament.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Today they were in no mood to surrender their supremacy underlined by right winger Robert Hawkins\u2019 11-try haul, which was a personal best after 10 tries for his club Halifax Panthers earlier this year.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Wheelchair World Cup Round 1
\nPool A: Ireland def. USA 110-10\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Feeding off 70 per cent possession it wasn\u2019t hard to see why Ireland got into a pointcoring rhythm early.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Twelve first-half tries set them up for a commanding 66-6 lead at the break.\u00a0
They scored 10 tries in the second by not letting their feet off the accelerator.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Captain Joseph Calcott topped the Irish scoresheet with seven tries but also pushed for 168 metres and made six line-breaks. He was a worthy Player of the Match winner.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ireland didn\u2019t win any of their three pool games at the 2022 World Cup but today turned that form on its head.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe last four years it\u2019s been the result of growing the game domestically,\u201d Calcott told NRL.com.<\/p>\n
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Irish luck on show in Wollongong<\/p>\n
\u201cIt sounds crazy but the last World Cup we had a lot of English players with Irish heritage. But we decided to unearth Irish talent and we found players like Cian Horgan, who was fantastic today.”<\/p>\n
Hargan scored Ireland\u2019s first try and then another five after that over the course of 80 minutes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have had this same squad together for almost three years now and we\u2019ve just kept improving massively,\u201d Calcott said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
USA scored the first point in the third minute through Antoine Gray but that\u2019s as good as it got in the opening 40 minutes for the Stars-and-Stripes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Skipper Jesse Lind scored their second 57 minutes later but the USA was no match for the speed and skill of the Irish.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Things don\u2019t get any easier for the Americans as they face heavyweights England n Round 2 on Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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\n England’s Robert Hawkins was a star on day one of the Wheelchair World Cup.
\n \u00a9Mark Nolan
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Pool A: England def. Wales 98-18\u00a0<\/p>\n
England has adopted a motto for this World Cup as they attempt to win back-to-back trophies.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re here to win it, not defend it,\u201d Robert Hawkins told NRL.com.<\/p>\n
Hawkins certainly did his part with his 11 tries from England\u2019s total of 18 along with four conversions. His personal tally of 52 points earned Hawkins the Player of the Match medal.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAdrenalin is still flowing through me so I think it will hit me later how my body reacts,\u201d said Hawkins, who several times landed on his back or face-planted the court trying to get the ball down.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cBut like I always say, those tries wouldn\u2019t have happened if I didn\u2019t have the boys around me.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Centre Nathan Collins wasn\u2019t far behind him with four tries and nine goals.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Wales giving nothing away easy in the first half<\/p>\n
The only sour note was in the 67th minute teammate Mason Billington had blood streaming from a head wound as he scored England\u2019s 14th try and had to undergo an HIA.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Wales was in the hunt midway through the first half with two fine tries to Stuart Williams and Sid Ramsey to keep on England\u2019s toes 18-12.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But then England clicked into gear with 28 unanswered points for a 46-12 half-time lead.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The crisp passing and support play were standouts from England\u2019s performance today \u2013 there was always someone on the inside or outside of the ball-carrier.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the best part of our team actually. There is so much love for each other that we\u2019d do anything for each other like backing each other 100 per cent on the field,\u201d Hawkins said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Next match for England is Ireland, who stayed behind in the stands today after their USA match to watch their opponents ahead of next Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ireland broke their international points record with their sterling 110-10 win over the USA, while England kept the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":946102,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-946101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946101","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=946101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/946101\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/946102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=946101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=946101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=946101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}