{"id":606417,"date":"2026-05-27T10:28:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T10:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/606417\/"},"modified":"2026-05-27T10:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T10:28:11","slug":"england-suffer-blow-ahead-of-rugby-league-world-cup-as-nrl-stars-confirm-pledge-allegiance-elsewhere","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/606417\/","title":{"rendered":"England suffer blow ahead of Rugby League World Cup as NRL stars confirm pledge allegiance elsewhere"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Brian McDermott\u2019s England side for the Rugby League World Cup will no doubt have plenty of NRL stars in and amongst it, but two in-form half-backs have both made a decision on their allegiance \u2013 and it\u2019s not to England.<\/p>\n

Canberra Raiders playmaker, Ethan Strange, is set to make his State of Origin debut this week, filling in for the injured Mitchell Moses.<\/p>\n

New NRL rules state that, now, any player playing in State of Origin can represent any nation they wish, as opposed to the previous rule where if you played in Origin you had to represent Australia.<\/p>\n

Strange qualifies for England through his mother, and ahead of last year\u2019s Ashes series was one player linked to potentially joining Shaun Wane\u2019s squad for the autumn series.<\/p>\n

He was named in the Australia squad instead, but did not play a game for the nation during their three-game tour. That left the door open for him to still join England, however he has now made it clear that the Kangaroos are the only national side he will represent.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve grown up in\u00a0Australia. My mum is from\u00a0England, and my grandma is from\u00a0New Zealand, but I\u2019ve grown up in\u00a0Australia. So yeah, I am an Aussie,\u201d he told Australian media outlet Zero Tackle.<\/p>\n

Wigan Warriors selection drama, Bradford\u2019s controversial \u2018no try\u2019 call and Las Vegas Teams revealed \u2013 Click here to listen to the latest episode of the Serious About Rugby League Show<\/a><\/p>\n

NRL stars reject England ahead of Rugby League World Cup<\/p>\n

Strange isn\u2019t the only player to blow off England this week, with Sydney Roosters half-back Sam Walker, who has been heavily reported with an England switch in the past, set to commit to Australia.<\/p>\n

Walker is the son of ex-player-turned-coach Ben Walker, who had Ben when he was playing for Leeds in 2002 \u2013 hence why he qualifies.<\/p>\n

However, Walker Snr has spoke to the media recently to say that his father [Sam\u2019s grandfather] would \u201cdisown him\u201d if he chose to play for England.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy father (Garry) would disown him. He\u2019s the proudest Aussie you\u2019ve ever come across,\u201d Ben said to the Canberra Times.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe couldn\u2019t do it because of \u2018Gaz\u2019, and Sam\u2019s allegiance is to Australia. He\u2019d love to play for Australia. He won\u2019t play for anyone else.\u201d<\/p>\n

Walker is another player making his Origin debut this week, with him and Strange lining up on opposite sides this week in Game I of the series.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brian McDermott\u2019s England side for the Rugby League World Cup will no doubt have plenty of NRL stars…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":606418,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-606417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=606417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606417\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/606418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=606417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=606417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=606417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}