England supporters rank the top five cross-code flops

The try-scoring winger joined Sale Sharks in 1998 on a two-year deal mainly funded by the RFU. Mather did not have the best of times with Sale and played for the club until his contract release in 2000. During that time Sale struggled to make an impact in the Premiership, and Mather never lived up to the hype that surrounded his transfer. He'd win just one England cap during his brief stint in Union.

A turbulent career in both codes, Paul is also a former New Zealand international in rugby league but his six caps for England were dreadful. He did do better for England Sevens, and was a member of the 2002 Commonwealth Games and 2006 Commonwealth Games squads, winning a silver medal in 2006. 

He returned for his rugby league swansong with Harlequins RL in 2006 before switching back to Leeds Carnegie to help them to achieve Premiership promotion in 2010. Now a commentator in league.

He began his League career with Wigan in 2005 and outside of a short stint with the Widnes Vikings in 2007, played with the Warriors until moving to Saracens in 2011.

While Tomkins initially struggled to adapt to union, his form during the beginning of the 2013/14 season saw him earn an England cap against Australia in November 2013.

Although he went on to make two further international appearances, he looked completely out of his depth and returned to league soon after.

The Volcano’ stormed onto the scene for Gloucester, doing something ridiculous like scoring five tries on his debut against Leeds, before qualifying for England on residency grounds.

International honours followed, with Vainikolo making his England debut against Wales in 2008. However, he failed to bring his try-scoring form to the international scene and was quickly dropped from Martin Johnston’s squad after winning five caps.

England, who fast-tracked Burgess into their World Cup squad in defiance of logic, Bath and the player himself each shoulder varying degrees of blame for arguably the greatest cross-code flop in history. We’re not saying he was an awful player, but the whole thing was a complete disaster.