Well we do disagree in part. Majority of NRL players are identified and contracted before first grade. If you came of age and entered a first grade team without an NRL team contacting you, you would be in a very very small group to then make it.. they all know that, that's their lives. Having a lottery ticket and thinking you're good chance of winning it are 2 very different things.
Besides, do you realise how much of an accomplishment it is to make Q-Cup? For a lot of players outside the small contigent I've outlined are very proud to make first grade.
Of course I realise how much of an accomplishment it is. A few lifelong friends made it to Q-Cup first grade and for them it was an amazing and proud achievement.
But making it there wasn’t the conclusion of a journey, they all had aspirations to go beyond it regardless of how distant and improbable that goal may have seemed.
Kids these days are even more fortunate with the systems in place. They are all a much better chance for the opportunities available at stepping up but again whether they do or don’t is another matter all together. All my time involved with Magpies or Wynnum or Pride at various stages I never met a first grader who didn’t want to try make it to NRL even for a game. Didn’t matter if they were 19 or 35 (as improbable and unrealistic as it was). That’s all I’m saying here.
I think we agree on the basis of your opinion that q-cup is a proud achievement. Whatever we believe otherwise (players within wanting to keep rising the levels of rugby league) doesn’t matter.