ENGLAND are confident of engineering a dramatic form turnaround to challenge Australia in their World Cup clash at Telstra Dome on Sunday.

The Lions escaped with a 32-22 win against Papua New Guinea at the weekend, while Australia justified their tournament favouritism with a comfortable 30-6 demolition of New Zealand in Sydney.

England coach Tony Smith said his side would have to improve markedly if they were to be competitive against the Kangaroos, but claimed they were also looking beyond that match. "It's not just a week [-long] tournament, it's over a period of time, so we'll keep on improving throughout the tournament. That's been one of our aims and we'll do that," Smith said.

"We're working on our deficiencies and some areas that we weren't as good as we needed to be, and even in some areas that we were good at but we were just a bit below par. It's all about making sure our strengths are up to speed and exploiting weaknesses where they are in the opposition - and we'll do that.

"We're happy with what we're doing and the way we're progressing and we know what we want to achieve here. The Australians are the favourites and deservedly so and good luck to them. But we'll be looking at their weaknesses, don't worry about that. We're not going to not look at their game."

Smith described his team's sluggish performance against PNG as "OK, just OK". England were heading for an embarrassing first-up defeat when they trailed 16-12 at the interval before picking up in the second half and running away with the contest.

"It's good to get that one out of the road. It's a few weeks since some of the players played - some of them hadn't played since our [English Super League] grand final … so a few cobwebs there," Smith said. "It's the first time these guys have been together for a little while too, so we were a bit below par."

The shining light from the tournament opener was the performance of winger Lee Smith, who marked his Test debut with a hat-trick of tries. But he remains in doubt for the match against Australia after picking up a leg injury against the Kumuls. "We'll monitor him through the week and make sure that if he's fit and healthy he'll play and if not he won't play - we're not willing to risk anybody," Smith said.

Meanwhile, back-rower Gareth Ellis said the Lions had the ability to bounce back and admitted the squad was quietly confident of causing an upset. "We were pretty disappointed with how we played. It wasn't the start we'd like to have gotten off to, but it just gives us a chance to look at the game now and improve on a number of aspects," Ellis said.

AAP