Rugby League dithers around trying to make itself relevant beyond its mainly western Sydney and Queensland base by fiddling with the rules. Meanwhile Rugby Union in Australia tries to make itself relevant….but doesn’t have the players. Simplest solution is for League to go back to Union rules. Keep the NRL and the clubs in a National Rugby League, under Union rules, and play the Kangaroos against the All Blacks. League at present has nowhere to go or grow by itself and Union is at a dead end without serious player pool growth in Australia. It’s time to bite the bullet and merge the games again!
Even the most staunch league fan is yearning for a contest and cannot argue that these floggings are not the best example of the game. My team getting pumped week in/out has dampened deep investment which has allowed to watch for the entertainment, the players and young fellas and not get too peturbed about the finals score. When Storm/Panthers play we know what to expect. Highly likely they will face each other in the GF so think of it like Bathurst, Frosty and Lowndesy are half a lap in front but the battle behind them is still provides a lot of entertainment.
People no longer are infatuated with Rugby League any more; we will just start going to different restaurants for their sauces. In reality, League is a nice simple sauce, it really should be the tomato sauce of the world, but we even have the restaurant critic (journalist) with the eccentric tastes trying to influence the kitchen and the customers (fans) are all shouting. So now what is the sauce we have??? Ok I might have pushed the sauce metaphor far enough…
Personally I put these extreme results more down to the transition of the rules rather than the rules themselves. We’re in a state of evolution, a couple of teams found themselves well placed in squad and tactics to take advantage of the new environment. Plenty of others found themselves badly equipped. But that will change, squads and tactics will balance to the new normal.
None of that is to say I adore the new rules, they may require further steps forward or back. I just think that doing it now would be a blind change, as the waters haven’t settled from the last change yet.
If you look at each of the changes that have been made to the game over time in isolation, eg. the uncontested scrum, the 10 metres, the captain’ challenge, and so on, they seem to be justifiable and even a step forward.
But when you look at where the game is now to where it once was, we seem to have lost something significant.
I’m not sure how we now can get all of the worms back in the can.
If he doesn’t do anything maybe V’Landys could be singing Disturbed’s Get Down With The Sickness…
We cannot take anything away from Melbourne though, they were coached on how they will win and their execution was near faultless. That first try to JAC was heads-up brilliance. Everytime they got in the redzone it was all eyes for Walker. And credit to the young fella that was a tough night, he got smacked repeatedly and kept getting up. It’s also probably time we started to recognise that the Roosters injuries are catching up with them. It’s a great squad but the spine are all (essentially) rookies and that has stretched to the bench. They will fight but I think it’s only the weakness of the bottom 8 that will keep them playing finals.
Meanwhile Sam Walker discovers that although the new rules may suit his game much of the time , great defence can still shut players and teams down. It didn’t look much like touch footy when the shadow on the PNG terror , Justim Olam came all too close for comfort.
I generally enjoy watching Melbourne play, and was really looking forward to a proper contest last night. But between commentators (Ch 9) calling it remotely and sounding like they would rather be in bed for the opening minute, no crowd, pumped in fake crowd noise, and the contest lacking any sort of competitiveness, it was a wildly disappointing game. When I switched over to see what the score was in the AFL between Richmond and the Gold Coast Suns ( a team where i couldn’t name a single player), i saw it was a contest and stayed with it instead.
There was the stat rolled out last night that the Storm and Panthers are both in the top 5 teams of all time for for and against after Round 15. The I’m not sick part is wow, how lucky are we to be living in an era where two of the best teams ever have emerged in the same season. The I’m not well part is yeah, right
Last night should have been one of our season’s blockbusters but it was poor.
40-14, 50-0, 44-18, 46-6, 48-0, 56-12, 38-12, 38-20, 46-4, 34-10, 38-12, 28-4, 28-6, 32-18, 46-0… these are scores from this season between current top eight sides
Penrith really need to perform tonight against the Eels to match Melbourne.
