Sometimes especially at the sharp end i think it comes down to attitude as much as anything else. Theres no doubt about it the standard of SL is a lot lower than NRL but that doesn't make all the teams in SL not worthy and i think we would compete for honors in the NRL if we were over there playing week in and week out at that level.
We (i think) are more than a match from Cronulla in terms of talent, they have some big names but so do we, williams would kill it in the NRL and Burgess showed for souths he could complete there. Lockers has been one of the best in the world over the last 5 years and Tommy L was playing that level just last year.
The big difference is they will come expecting to win and play play with that arrogance and confidence. We need to match that, but what English teams tend to do when facing "superior" opposition (this goes for all sports both national and domestic teams) we play to not lose.
It seems systematically inbred in us to fear, and we often try and mitigate opponents than beat them and invariably we come up short. I think its just in our mentality because if a sportsmen/team does show these traits they are often labelled "arrogant" or "big headed" and quickly fall out of favor with the public.
To put it bluntly when you have a guy running at you hard with the ball you have 2 options, stand there and wait dig your heels in and hope that you can land a decent shot. Or you can run at him and smash him to pieces we need to do more of the latter
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure
