2023 - Oceania Tri-Nations (Pacific Championship)

[Perth Red]

Thanks

52 to 4 in melb

then go back 50 years for the last time England or gb won a series

don’t blame us

So 2 drubbings and half a dozen competitive games. If that’s the bar then might as well forget the pacific championships as no chance anyone beating kangaroos in it.

 

[Wb1234]

So 2 drubbings and half a dozen competitive games. If that’s the bar then might as well forget the pacific championships as no chance anyone beating kangaroos in it.

50 years breeds apathy

 

[Perth Red]

Attendance :18,144

 

[bad boy bubby]

1994/95 was arguably the pinnacle for test RL in the modern era Then SL and int Rl became erratic and secondary to origin. nrls apathy to the kangaroos has just grown and grown since mid 2000’s

I agree somewhat, but what also happened in that period, 1996, was when the England Rugby League changed to a summer season. Basically cancelling out the full blown Kangaroo and GB tours.
Personally I loved those tours, and the games were generally a lot more competitive.
At the same time frame the NRL Corp deciding to have more teams and a longer competition meant that the only real time the NRL could spare rounds was during the big money spinner, SOO. Even the ANZAC test vs Kiwis was abandoned.
This also happened in cricket where once an Ashes tour was a real conglomerate of events. Now it's a FIFO episode because of international programming.
I am in the minority in the fact I'd prefer Test rugby league to be the pinnacle and would love to have tests as the mid season highlight. I've lost a lot of interest in SOO over the last 20 years and really only watch it because it is a high standard game and enjoy seeing what tactics, or lack of, are used, unless I fall asleep haha.
I do get that SOO brings in the bucks, so my desire, in regards to tests, will probably never happen.

 

[yakstorm]

View attachment 80721
Attendance :18,144

Not a bad opener, outside of the opening 15 minutes, Samoa really muscled up and challenged Australia.

Good signs for Toa considering how many players they were missing.

Looking forward to Kiwis v Toa next week at Eden Park.

 

[isaiah]

Tabuai-Fidow the first dolphin? What about in the 60’s and 70’s

 

[Ideas Man Stephen]

I agree somewhat, but what also happened in that period, 1996, was when the England Rugby League changed to a summer season. Basically cancelling out the full blown Kangaroo and GB tours.
Personally I loved those tours, and the games were generally a lot more competitive.
At the same time frame the NRL Corp deciding to have more teams and a longer competition meant that the only real time the NRL could spare rounds was during the big money spinner, SOO. Even the ANZAC test vs Kiwis was abandoned.
This also happened in cricket where once an Ashes tour was a real conglomerate of events. Now it's a FIFO episode because of international programming.
I am in the minority in the fact I'd prefer Test rugby league to be the pinnacle and would love to have tests as the mid season highlight. I've lost a lot of interest in SOO over the last 20 years and really only watch it because it is a high standard game and enjoy seeing what tactics, or lack of, are used, unless I fall asleep haha.
I do get that SOO brings in the bucks, so my desire, in regards to tests, will probably never happen.

Your sentiments to Origin are the same as mine. I’m not passionate about it one bit, although still enjoy watching it due to the intensity and standard. I don’t enjoy it anywhere near as much Sharks v whoever.

Likewise too, I would prefer to see internationals mid season, because in fairness, it’s the only time it will really have a chance of succeeding.

 

[RedVee_8]

Not according to this

Test Series List - RLP

Summary of statistics and results relating to the .

www.rugbyleagueproject.org

Which one are you talking about?

I think the SFS loss with Hornby may have been a tri nations game.

hardly a fight when Mason clocked Stuart fielden when he wasn’t expecting it.

henderson gill.

Thanks.

I may have confused two games I went to in the 80s together. I’m sure I went to one at the SCG as well.

 

[titoelcolombiano]

Not a bad opener, outside of the opening 15 minutes, Samoa really muscled up and challenged Australia.

Good signs for Toa considering how many players they were missing.

Looking forward to Kiwis v Toa next week at Eden Park.

Samoa and Tonga are like the Kiwi sides of the 90s and 00s. They need tournament play to find their rhythm. But when they do can turn it on against anyone.

 

[Wb1234]

Not sold out

 

[miguel de cervantes]

Yeh Soz, giving up on the International game. Half empty stadium. Non neutral Ref, etc etc. always got local footy with a pie and beer. Who honestly needs this quickly put together we don’t give a shit system.

further to my above rebuke, we have the women's games which, are highly competitive and entertaining, in parallel, live televised games from Port Moresby, and Samoa "only" going down by about 20 points to Australia which 20 years would be fantasy. I don't thing things are as bad as you think, crowds or not.

 

[Coastbloke]

Boxing on at my local club. Pacific bowl must have been cancelled…

 

[Coastbloke]

further to my above rebuke, we have the women's games which, are highly competitive and entertaining, in parallel, live televised games from Port Moresby, and Samoa "only" going down by about 20 points to Australia which 20 years would be fantasy. I don't thing things are as bad as you think, crowds or not.

No sorry, they only had to fill 30,000 seats with amount of names in both teams. It wasn’t Accor.

A non-neutral Ref cost a player a famous Test try like was it Ryan Hall in that ‘ankle tap.’ It’s just embarrassingly amateur and unforgivable..

I’ll NZ-Samoa a go being at Eden Park and a Neutral ref given he’ll be Australian again, but Roos v NZ in front of tops 20,000 with another Australian ref can f*** off. I’d rather watch PNG v Fiji tbh..

 

[Last Week]

So, after the first weekend of these "Championships", it's clear that the interest for the matches from fans and networks is waning.

Fox Sports, to their credit, have tried to promote it and push it (because they need content), but the commentators have just struggled.

The disappointing points of the tournaments;

* The competitions should be one. No 'bye' weeks. Having a 'Bowl' reduces the legitimacy of that tournament.
* Players not staying in camp. Just shows that the matches are merely exhibitions.
* Non neutral ref's and not using international rules. They exist. Fly them over.
*Not having an island nation play at Commbank. Australia vs Samoa would have got close to a sell out and rewarded the island nation fans for their relatively recent support.
*Hard to have a 'Pacific Championship' without having one of the major Pacific nations (Tonga) involved.

The players deserve as much of the blame as the NRL for this. They agreed to half a handful of international matches a year, slap some half arsed competitions together and expect people to buy into it. They deserve what they get.

 

[yakstorm]

They would have been better to have taken a 'less is more' approach to the tournament.

If they weren't going to be able to run any more than a 4 week competition, they should have either organised either a 4 or 5 team single competition so your big teams (Kiwis, Kangaroos, Toa, Kumuls) are playing weekly and allow the tournament to build some momentum.

Melbourne has actually moved a decent number of tickets off the back of Saturday's game (lower bowl sides are almost all gone), but it would be almost a guaranteed sell out if the Kangaroos were playing next week, instead tickets will possibly trickle until a few days out. Eden Park has showed some promising signs, but it would have moved a lot more if the Kiwis had actually played this weekend.

Imagine if instead of kicking off with Australia v Samoa at Townsville, we could have had Australia v PNG up there and saved Australia v Samoa for somewhere like Commbank or Mt Smart? I'm sure the broadcasters would have preferred something like that as well, especially after a solid 700K+ for Saturday's game (and 350Kish for the Jillaroos).

 

[jim_57]

They would have been better to have taken a 'less is more' approach to the tournament.

If they weren't going to be able to run any more than a 4 week competition, they should have either organised either a 4 or 5 team single competition so your big teams (Kiwis, Kangaroos, Toa, Kumuls) are playing weekly and allow the tournament to build some momentum.

Melbourne has actually moved a decent number of tickets off the back of Saturday's game (lower bowl sides are almost all gone), but it would be almost a guaranteed sell out if the Kangaroos were playing next week, instead tickets will possibly trickle until a few days out. Eden Park has showed some promising signs, but it would have moved a lot more if the Kiwis had actually played this weekend.

Imagine if instead of kicking off with Australia v Samoa at Townsville, we could have had Australia v PNG up there and saved Australia v Samoa for somewhere like Commbank or Mt Smart? I'm sure the broadcasters would have preferred something like that as well, especially after a solid 700K+ for Saturday's game (and 350Kish for the Jillaroos).

At the very very least we could have had teams on the “bye” week playing tests against each other and/or Lebanon. Having any team having a bye is such a waste of a weekend in the very limited international window.

Week 1 - NZ V Fiji (warm up test for both, recent history of close games).
Week 2 - PNG V Australia or Lebanon (double header with Fiji V Cook Islands).
Week 3 - Samoa V Cook Islands or Lebanon.

 

[Last Week]

I posted a few days ago about my proposed international calendar.

I've changed my mind.

4Nations every year (except world cup years) with a qualifier depending on the hosting region. Like we did for a few years.

Honestly, how do we f**k ourselves so much so often.

 

[Brian potter]

I posted a few days ago about my proposed international calendar.

I've changed my mind.

4Nations every year (except world cup years) with a qualifier depending on the hosting region. Like we did for a few years.

Honestly, how do we f**k ourselves so much so often.

That was perfect and slowly growing with each tournament.

ideal world was France, England, Australia and New Zealand in the northern hemisphere and England, Australia, New Zealand and pacific qualifying winners for the southern hemisphere.

 

[Perth Red]

I’m a bit old school when it comes to tests and much prefer a 3 match series over these one off ‘tournaments‘.

a series feels like they are playing for something, these one offs feel like exhibition games.

Ideally this year should have been
Australia v nz
Samoa v fiji
png v france
Eng v tonga

same for women.
8 games a weekend for 3 weeks.
far more worthwhile.

 

[RedVee_8]

So, after the first weekend of these "Championships", it's clear that the interest for the matches from fans and networks is waning.

Fox Sports, to their credit, have tried to promote it and push it (because they need content), but the commentators have just struggled.

The disappointing points of the tournaments;

* The competitions should be one. No 'bye' weeks. Having a 'Bowl' reduces the legitimacy of that tournament.
* Players not staying in camp. Just shows that the matches are merely exhibitions.
* Non neutral ref's and not using international rules. They exist. Fly them over.
*Not having an island nation play at Commbank. Australia vs Samoa would have got close to a sell out and rewarded the island nation fans for their relatively recent support.
*Hard to have a 'Pacific Championship' without having one of the major Pacific nations (Tonga) involved.

The players deserve as much of the blame as the NRL for this. They agreed to half a handful of international matches a year, slap some half arsed competitions together and expect people to buy into it. They deserve what they get.

But the Bowl is there for PNG. Gives them the chance to host games and potentially some silverware for them to win.
Plus I guess they wanted to keep Cook Islands away from the heavyweights - Aus, NZ, Samoa