Tests are tops, but only when the boys don't hold back
By Phil Gould
April 24, 2005
The Sun-Herald
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Rugby league needs more international competition. I always enjoy watching our national team play. I love international football.
For me there has always been a mystique about Test football and being selected to play for Australia.
I can remember back in the 1960s when my father would get me up in the early hours to listen to the radio broadcast of the Kangaroos playing against the Pommies in England.
He took me to the Test matches at the Sydney Cricket Ground. I remember sitting at the back of the old Sheridan Stand on wooden seats watching the Great Britain team containing Malcolm Reilly, Tommy Bishop and Roger the Dodger Millward defeat the Aussies in the 1970 Test series.
Will we ever get back to those days? Will we ever see real Test football again in the true sense of the word?
I guess over the past 97 years there have been periods when Test football lived up to its true meaning, but it is a long time since our national rugby league team has been subjected to a true Test.
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AdvertisementSure, they have lost the odd game here and there to the Poms or the Kiwis, but when it really counts the Kangaroos are light years ahead.
I enjoyed the game between Australia and New Zealand on Friday night. There was a good crowd of 40,000 fans indicating a hunger for international competition in our sport.
I love watching the green and gold jerseys run out to the cheers of the fans. I love watching the game's best players come together and combine their talents and skills against another country.
I wish we could do more to put international football on a pedestal. I just know that to do this we have to help improve our opposition.
Ours is a great sporting team with a proud record. However, the Kangaroos will never get the recognition they deserve until people think they are beating quality opponents. The match on Friday night appeared to be played at a slower pace than some NRL games I have seen this season.
The Australians were travelling within themselves and the Kiwis seemed to be under the pump.
It is unfair on the players for them to play knowing their club is going to need them again within 24 hours for a club fixture. I am sure this was a factor as the intensity went out of the Test in the final 20 minutes.
The day must surely come when international football demands its own weekend and players can rip into their work without holding something back.
Our opposition will not improve until they get to play against Australia on a more regular basis.
The one-off Test matches do nothing for them. They need more exposure to three-game series in which they can improve from one game to the next.
The Tri-Nations series played in October in England was a success and we need more of it.
I would hope the day would come when this triangular competition could be played here to packed stadiums, with fans going to games nervous about whether our boys can win. That's when you have a truly international game.
We are a long way away from that occurring but we have to start somewhere.
The other thing we have to do is help make our opposition stronger by making more players available to them. Australia need to assist more in development programs for their junior players and providing scholarships and elite coaching.
The New Zealand players who went around on Friday night never stopped trying but they were never going to win. The major problem is that it was not the best team New Zealand could name.
For a start, they had players like Sione Faumuina, Joe Galuvao, Tevita Latu, Tony Puletua, Iosia Soliola, Brent Webb and the precocious talent of Sonny Bill Williams unavailable for selection because of injury or suspension.
There is no doubt these players would have made a difference for the Kiwis.
But there's more. The following players could be available to the Kiwi selectors if it weren't for qualification restrictions or representative retirement: Tonie Carroll, Luke Covell, Sam Harris, Karmichael Hunt, Stacey Jones, Reni Maitua, Willie Mason, Timana Tahu, Brad Thorn, Johnathan Thurston, Anthony Tupou, Richard Villasanti and Carl Webb.
These names have been supplied to me by league guru David Middleton.
If the Australian Rugby League could encourage young players in our system to use their qualification to play for New Zealand, then look at the quality of the team they could put on the field. Give kids incentive to play for New Zealand.
If they are raised in Australia and come through the Australian league development system, allow them to play State of Origin football if they are good enough, but don't let state representation affect their international status.
We have more than enough players to go around and we owe it to those selected to play for Australia that their victories against other nations count for something special.
We could name four or five teams that would beat the New Zealand and Great Britain national teams.
I would go as far as to say that most of our club teams would prove too strong for the international competitors we oppose.
Harsh criticism, I know, but I would back it in.
Anyway, let's not take too much away from the pride and prestige our players obviously have every time they pull on the green and gold colours.
What I am most proud of is that our game's elite talent really do love playing together and being selected to play for their country remains the greatest individual honour the game of rugby league can bestow.
