Rugby League World Cup: Josh Addo-Carr stars as Australia reach semi-finals with resounding win over Lebanon

Josh Addo-Carr was the star of the game as Australia defeated Lebanon 44-8 in the World Cup.

Addo-Carr scored a hat-trick in the first 19 minutes of the game and added two more after the break as the Australians raced to a big lead.

Josh went over in the corner.

Australia will play New Zealand in the last four on November 11th.

Mal Meninga's green and golds dominated from start to finish, with Liam Martin and Latrell Mitchell scoring two tries each.

Meninga has admitted that he has faced a number of selection dilemma in the search for his strongest line-up for the knockout stages of the competition.

The players mostly vindicated his decisions. The half-back who was given the nod ahead of Cherry-Evans was excellent with the ball in hand.

The return of Addo-Carr is less controversial than the debate over the center and hooker positions.

He didn't equal or better the record of six international tries in a single match for Australia, having taken his tally to five with more than 20 minutes remaining.

With 11 tries for Addo-Carr already in the tournament, the record of 12 in a single World Cup tournament now looks closer to being reached. Billy Slater has a World Cup record of 16 tries.

Meninga will be pleased by the way his side kept Lebanon to a solitary try, scored by a player who was in his squad at the previous World Cup.

The Australians have conceded 38 points in 15 World Cup matches over the past three editions.

Mal Meninga is very happy to have gotten through the game. It's injury-free for us. It wasn't very fast with the ball, but I was pleased with the effort.

James Tedesco came off at half-time to be safe. We decided not to allow him to go back on at the half-time break.

It was hard to get any traction in the ruck. We played great football when we did. We were solid on the defensive side of the ball.

Lebanon head coach Michael Cheika said that his team was blown away by higher quality. After the first half, they were able to do whatever they wanted.

It wasn't the performance we wanted, but at the same time we showed a lot of spirit and resilience to stay in there and play a physical contest until the end.

Australia has a high amount of quality so nobody is surprised by the result.