Milford the Sneak

[ZEROMISSTACKLES]

Would be nice to have him back but if he don't want to play then all good.

 

[Foreign Legion]

Samoa coach Matt Parish believes Anthony Milford definitely wanted to play in Saturday's Test against Tonga.
The Broncos five-eighth was instead limited to a social media spectator on Saturday night, tweeting numerous well wishes to his countrymen during and after their thrilling 24-22 win in Parramatta.
Milford had originally been named by Parish to lead Samoa against Tonga during the representative round, but was dramatically blocked by club coach Wayne Bennett a fortnight ago.
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There was a school of thought that the mastercoach was simply taking a bullet for his gifted playmaker, who feared ruining his chances of representing Queensland or Australia later on in the year.
But Parish moved to clarify the situation after the win, claiming he had a number of texts from Milford that showed how desperate he wanted to be on the field against Tonga.
"One, he shouldn't have been denied the opportunity to play tonight. And he shouldn't be put in a position where he has to choose," Parish said.
"I think Josh McGuire showed last year what it meant to play for Samoa.
"The boys were all really proud of where he's got to now and what he did (for the Kangaroos) last night, he was terrific. We've got no doubt Tony will do the same thing."

Parish praised Super League side Hull FC for releasing star pair Frank Pritchard and Tonga counterpart Sika Manu to travel around the world and feature in the one-off Test.
"I think Hull show a lot of respect for representative football. It's a shame the clubs in Australia don't do the same thing," he said.
Tonga coach Kristian Woolf said he hadn't experienced as many availability issues this year compared to previous years, but was still flummoxed by the current eligibility rules that prevented a number of stars from turning out for him.
"I get text messages all day and phone calls all week about blokes wanting to play. There's plenty of blokes who'd love to be in camp," he said.
"(But) as a result of the rules, unfortunately they're not able to.
"You chuck some guys who are watching rep footy this weekend, you chuck a Tui Lolohea or a Will Hopoate or someone like that into those sides, they give you some class and some skill.
"That goes along with the toughness and all the other things that we've already got there, and it certainly adds to the game."


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/...att-parish-20160507-gop0oe.html#ixzz480d12iP3

 

[hutch]

I don't understand that article. So both coaches want players who would rather play for NZ and Australia? Players who would drop these teams at first chance to play for other countries. They should be pushing for rules which lock the current players in so they get to keep working with them and can build some combinations over the next few years.

 

[shinobi]

Rekon if milford could play for samoa without ruling him out of origin contention he would.

 

[ZEROMISSTACKLES]

This isn't a big deal to me. Milford is actually Australian born. I'm sure he had a few laughs representing his heritage in the rlwc but he wasn't seriously going to be playing for Samoa long term.

Im sure you don't know him.

Rekon if milford could play for samoa without ruling him out of origin contention he would.

Thanks to the new article provided by Foreign Legion and thanks for that FL he DEFINITELY would. That game against Tonga was the main event of the weekend, you wanna be part of that.