World champions England were beaten by France when they began the defence of their wheelchair rugby league title at Medway Park on Wednesday night.

The host nation won the inaugural World Cup in Australia five years ago but they lacked discipline against the French.

Jack Heggie opened the scoring with a penalty but France led when Nicolas Claussells’ try was converted by Mikel Guane. Although Andy Wharton scored England’s first try, France took a 12-8 lead into the break when Dany Delaweare crossed to score.

England drew level through a Chris Greenhalgh try after the interval but 10 unanswered points put France in control.

Two late tries from Jack Brown couldn’t get England back into the contest as France held on to win 28-20.

Team manager Martin Coyd said: "There were a lot of positives in the performance that we are now analyising. There are areas we can improve on.

"We're not going to win the World Cup on the first game.

"That was our first game for a long while and we will continue to get better and stronger.

"We've got a game against Ireland on Saturday and then we play Wales on Tuesday."

Coyd also praised the organisation and atmosphere at the event after an entertaining first day of matches.

"The stands were full and the atmosphere was fantastic," he said.

"Medway Council have done a fantastic job putting on the event and I promise you that everyone who was there on Wednesday will want to come back. It was an excellent game that could have gone either way in the last five minutes."

Medway Dragons duo Coyd and Mark Roughsedge are England’s manager and assistant coach respectively. England meet Ireland in their next pool game at Medway Park on Saturday at 4pm.