Jamie Langley column: The English boys did their best to replicate our Ashes success this week when we had an alternative training day.

We have a few of those days dotted through the season when we get a long week like Saturday to Sunday, so Monday was cricket day.

We drew out of a hat for the teams and usually it’s the likes of Dave Halley and Koppy who are the worst players. But this year Tom Olbison definitely took the biscuit.

He got three warnings for his action because he’d never bowled before so he never quite got the concept of keeping a straight arm when you’re turning the ball over.

He was just throwing it, literally running up and chucking the ball down the wicket. He must have thought it was baseball or something.

After a couple of warnings they decided to pull him out so it was a bit of a shambolic display.

It was a little bit embarrassing for us English lads because everyone knows the Aussies can play cricket, while some of ours hadn’t even seen a cricket bat before.

There were a couple of stand-out performances with the bat. BK (Brett Kearney) and BJ (Ben Jeffries) both went well, so all the Bs.

Lynchy also had a good knock and Pat Ah Van came out of nowhere. He could be the first Samoan cricket international because, although he didn’t have much technique, he was swinging for the fences and it happened to come off.

Aside from the cricket, we also got the barbies out and the injured lads were in charge of the cooking.

Bryn (Hargreaves), in particular, was super-enthusiastic about it and he spent the whole day before preparing loads of marinades and brought all his new barbecue kit with him.

I’ve never seen anyone so keen in my life, for an Englishman anyway.

The whole day was a good chance to boost morale. We probably can’t train any harder than we’re training so it’s nice to do something like that when you get an extra day.

It brings the lads together and hopefully it’ll help keep confidence high ahead of the St Helens game. It’ll be tough but we’ve got belief in ourselves.