Kangaroos coach Mal Meninga has responded to scathing criticism from Andrew Johns and Brad Fittler following Australia’s shock loss to Tonga.

The former league greats accused Australia of disrespecting their opponents after suffering a historic 16-12 defeat in Auckland.

Meninga welcomed the passion but said the comments were an emotional response.

“I’m glad Freddy and Joey are emotional about it,” Meninga said.

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“Maybe in the light of day they might not have said what they said. They got emotional. It’s good to see the green and gold is important to them.

“It’s an emotional comment. They are entitled to those comments. We are bitterly disappointed with the result but not with the effort – just the way we executed. We weren’t composed enough.

“The team is hurting.”

Johns said the current crop of Kangaroos needed to have “a real hard look at themselves”.

Mal Meninga said the Australian side was hurting after the loss. Source: Getty Images

“It was the last game and I think they were thinking they would roll the sleeves up for 20 minutes and they would get the job done,” Johns said.

Fittler, meanwhile, claimed some players had let the jersey down and were simply waiting for the rugby league calendar to finish.

He predicted some axings by coach Mal Meninga for their poor showings.

“If Mal is fair dinkum, he is looking at that game thinking, ‘We might need a few new players here’, because I thought some of their efforts were terrible,” he said.

“They didn’t put their hands up in big moments and took really easy options and let each other down. They let Australia down. They let the jersey down. “

“They set a great standard down in Illawarra and they just didn’t back it up at all, so there is a good chance a few of these guys won’t be there next year.”

Fittler took particular aim at Daly Cherry-Evans and Latrell Mitchell, the latter of whom the NSW State of Origin coach dropped after game one this year.

“Daly Cherry-Evans wasn’t doing anything in attack,” Fittler said.

“He was giving no direction, but his defence was giving them so much trouble. He left poor Jack Wighton and a few of them stranded at different times.

“Latrell Mitchell came up with some bad errors and some really soft options.”