State of rugby in UK

[robjoenz]

Just heard when listening to GMR that there is a phone-in at 7 pm on Friday night about where the recent tests and world cup win leaves rugby (league and union) in England.

Is it likely they just bang on about rah rah world cup?

[the grinch]

this is the problem although the G.B team tryed there best against austrailia they lost three nil and the genral public look upon rugby league as losers and the current rugby union as winners even in wigan schools this is the case my little girl goes to a local school and one young lad was wearing an orrell top so i said i watch wigan warriors he replied rugby league are losers! and these are fans of the future which code is now up in the air!(i did mention that all the trys where scored by ex leauge stars)

[Alex the Warrior]

Hopefully, this will just be a short term fad with the newly found ra ra supporters. Unfortunately, the timing of the games could not have been worse with the 3 tests played on the week ends of the RU Q.F. S.F. and Final. Their interest in RU is either faslse or will last as long as it takes to watch a couple of club games.

The fear is that RL has lost the ground it had made up after they courted sections of the media and were starting to get more coverage. On Sunday, the Mail only gave the result of the RL test without even the smallest report. No-one would consider mentioning that we lost by a total of just 13 points over 3 tests to the Aussies at their leading sport (ignoring the relative weakness of this Aussie side), whilst RU is a minority sport over there.

[ian.birchall]

But if you read the Daily Telegraph you would have seen that in Oz the head RUgger Bugger was complaining that the Aussie RL board had Deliberately fixed the 3 tests for the days that the Aussie RU side were due to play their quarter, semi and final games to destroy any interest in the Wallabies. Its all relevant, RL is the game in Oz but would you want to be aussie even so? :sly:

[PieEaterinWales]

robjoenz posted:
Just heard when listening to GMR that there is a phone-in at 7 pm on Friday night about where the recent tests and world cup win leaves rugby (league and union) in England.

Is it likely they just bang on about rah rah world cup?

I am a Wigan rugby League Fan and a fan of Rugby League.

Watching the Rugby League World Cup Final and the last test at Huddersfield last Saturday there is little differnce in fitness levels, perhaps League players are the fitter.

But you have to take your hats off to the union guys, were they triumphed was in the mental stamina stakes. after being pegged back twice, once in the second half and again in extra time they did not drop there heads or believe they were going to lose. They stuck to the game plan and did not give in right to the death. Thats were the Great Britain Rugby league boys let themselves down.

As an aside it was good to see ex league boys score all the tries in the final.

[DaveO]

PieEaterinWales posted:

But you have to take your hats off to the union guys, were they triumphed was in the mental stamina stakes.

I think this so called lack of mental stamina problem for GB RL is a bit of a myth. I think the problems are far more basic.

I think the problems with GB are:

Too many foreign players in the UK so we end up with only one specialist winger in the squad and playing 3 loose forwards.

A lack of basic skills - we drop the ball and complete fewer sets of six than the Aussies due to handling errors.

Indiscipline. Getting sent off and giving penalties away when we should not.

If you watch the replay of the last test, just before the Aussies score the first of the last two tries the tackle count comes up.

We had made 260 tackles at that stage compared to their 200.

Why?

Well I reckon because we coughed up the ball either by mistakes or penalites being given away so we were having to defend all the time.

If a side has to put in that many tackles it does not matter how much mental toughness you have, you will just run out of steam and GB did.

As to the RU boys, well don't forget Aussie RU were the underdogs and England RU were expexted to win easier than they did.

England have been the world No. 1 team for some time. You can't say that about GB RL so I also don't think we are comparing like with like.

Dave

[Welski]

DaveO posted:



England have been the world No. 1 team for some time. You can't say that about GB RL so I also don't think we are comparing like with like.

Dave

In general I don't think you are comparing like with like. The 2 codes whilst sharing a common ancestry are now quite different. You only have to look at the cross code games to see that or take a look at the players who cross codes. The pivotal backs highlight the point particularly well. Wingers/full backs tend to make the move easier but you only have to look how tough it has been for the likes of Henry Paul and Iestyn Harris both key players in league. They have both struggled when played in the vital 'fly half' berth in union.

League and Union in my opinion are both great games to watch and hats off to the Union boys for their success. I know some of you guys can't stand Union and I totally sympathise. There is a lot more to contribute to a dull union game than RL one with the added technicalities etc and hence you tend to get a more dull ones. Both codes can still serve up some turkeys but on the whole the standards these days are top notch.

I would say the GB side are no less talented than the English union boys, perhaps if they had someone like Clive Woodward in charge with the emphasis he has brought to winning at international level (the World Cup) then we wouldn't have come unstuck so depressingly as we did in the Ashes tests.

I prepare to be ceremonial lynched by you ardent RL fans !!!

[the grinch]

i dont think it will be long before union and league are playing under one code. union need our players to sucseed and we need the financial freedom.league cannot let the likes of halifax and castleford dictate how much top teams spend this will only harm our sport

[DaveO]

the grinch posted:
i dont think it will be long before union and league are playing under one code. union need our players to sucseed and we need the financial freedom.league cannot let the likes of halifax and castleford dictate how much top teams spend this will only harm our sport

Union have got their own money problems believe it or not.

Leeds Tykes and Rotheram don't get a cut of the Sky cash. It is divied up between the 10 founder members of the RU premier league or whatever it is called.

They won't share wit ith the new boys which basically means they want to guarentee they never get relegated as they wil have the financial clout to get the best players unlike Leeds and Rotheram.

Gary hetherington is not pleased and told the RFU where to stuff an offer of a loan offered instead of a share of the spoils.

Nice to know they are as short sighted as RL chairman are famous for being and ironic to see Gary Hetherington down at the bottom fighting the corner of the minow against the big boys.

Of course the RFU tried to keep all this hushed up when it kicked off around the weekend of the RFU WC final.

Dave