England Women 54 Canada Women 4: Leeds Rhinos players shine again in big RLWC2021 win

Goldthorp’s Leeds teammates Courtney Winfield-Hill and Roche combined from the base of a scrum midway into Canada’s half and pace and evasion took the full-back clear for an outstanding score.

That was almost matched moments later, five minutes before half-time, by stand-off Roche who put on a step to open up the defence and then paced away from the chasers to grab another picture try.

England ran in 11 tries to add to the 14 scored in their 72-4 procession against Brazil four days earlier, but didn’t need to get out of second gear.

Realistically the opening two games, against inexperienced opposition, were always going to be big wins, but they have acted as tune-ups for the tougher challenges which begin against Papua New Guinea at Headingley on Wednesday.

England have done what they needed to do and in some style at times, scoring good tries and defending strongly when necessary, though they made a few too many errors against the Ravens.

Like Brazil, Canada managed one try, centre Petra Woods stretching over eight minutes into the second period to make it 44-4, but were spirited throughout.

PNG, though, will be a much bigger test and Australia and New Zealand - one of which awaits in the semi-finals next weekend - are on a completely different level.

The first-half at Wigan wasn’t entirely one-sided, despite England scoring six unanswered tries. Canada conceded in the opening moments, but applied some pressure until Hollie-Mae Dodd went over after 16 minutes.

Canada lacked creativity in the halves, but had some strong runners and packed a punch in defence at times, Laura Mariu flattening Shona Hoyle with a big hit early on.

England made the perfect start, Leah Burke crossing after an error by Canada from the kick-off.

Georgia Wilson went over from Tara Stanley’s pass after a clever cross-field kick by Leeds’ Courtney Winfield-Hill and Roche’s lovely pass created Dodd’s second touchdown.

The tries by Goldthorp and Roche took England out from 20-0 after 32 minutes to 30-0 at the break.

Stanley went over twice in the opening five minutes of the second half, before Canada broke their duck.

Winfield-Hill could have scored herself, but opted to put Carrie Roberts over and the half-century came up with a quarter of the game remaining, when Stanley, the reigning Woman of Steel, completed her hat-trick.

Winfield-Hill had another influential game. She almost scored from a brilliant run through the middle, but was tackled just short, only to kick to the corner for Burke to grab her second which completed the scoring 13 minutes from time.

England: Goldthorp, Wilson, Stanley, Roberts, Burke., Roche, Winfield-Hill, Hoyle, Bennett, Travis, Dodd, Rydge, Molyneux. Subs Whitfield, Stott, Hornby, Anderson.

Canada: Gauto, Jones, Aberg, Woods, Mueller, Mariu, McDaid, Sargent, Tam, Okonkwo, Hindley, Choboter, Pakulis. Subs Evans, Steele, Douglas, Siciliano.

Referee: Paki Pakinson (New Zealand).