Quote ="Charlie Sheen"There was, but defences were slower and more fragmented too. The "biff" as it's so affectionately referred to was nothing more than thuggery and cheap shotting most of the time, there wasn't skill or toughness involved.'"
Unless you were there to witness the real 'Era of the biff' then your comments do not have substance. As has been stated by others todays game is more athletic but certainly not more skilled and with not any more individual pace. If you had been around in the 50's and 60's you would have seen real toughness on display from most teams.
The players were part time but fit. No SL player is tougher or fitter than the likes of Vince Karalius who Alex Murphy recalled used to run 6 miles from Widnes to St Helens to training and back two evenings a week. On his GB debut in the 2nd test in Brisbane in 1958 he had injured his back in the first half and couldn't stand up in the dressing room at half time. But GB had had several players injured including the captain and prop Alan Prescott who had broken his arm in the third minute but continued to play the whole match. On seeing this Karalius staggered out of the dressing room and moved from loose forward to replace stand-off Dave Bolton who had come off with a broken collarbone. He went on to play a viatal role in the test victory for GB and IMO would have been just as tough and skilled had he played in SL.
Or nearer to home take Jack Fairbank (father of Karl) a farmer by day who trained in the evenings but was built like a rock and was a ferocious tackler. Remember that these were the days where all played 80 minutes with no subs and the packs competed for the ball. For part of this period there were unlimited tackles too so defenders often had to keep tackling for many minutes at a time. Rugby League has always been a tough and skillful game so do not take for granted that the game is tougher or more skillful these days.
