oh is that right mr smarty pants??

seems enough of your lot out here after upending their entire lives, leaving home & families etc just to move to the other side of the planet for a little sun & some skin cancer

The idea is to spread the sport out around the country, you just can't play every game at some suburban ehole in sydney

Shark Park you say???

who was going to turn up for a game at shonk park?

My point about Kear was more that we can't keep blaming the Australians for not giving us the attention we think we deserve when the European nations simply can't keep up with the standard they are aspiring to. That's nothing to do with the cost of living in Australia.

Kear has (as, have all British coaches) been involved in elite talent development for the best part of 20 years, and yet we still can't build a competitive side - that's a failure of the game in Europe. Our best talent has to go to Australia to earn a fair salary - that's a failure commercially at club level (although I know people prefer to use the RFL as a lightening rod on that one).

We can't keep blaming the Australians for showing no interest in international RL when we're providing no reason for them to take any interest in us. England hasn't won a single fixture against the Aussies in something like 11 years - I can't think of another sport where arguably it's biggest rivalry is so pathetically one-sided.

Well Queensland won 8 consecutive series in the State of Origin games.

But they weren’t all 3-0 series whitewashs. When did Austrailia last lose a game? The best thing to get Austrailians interested in watching international again would be for Australia to get knocked out in the semi final, that would take some of the arrogance out of them.

Well that's the AB's buggered then isn't it

Having watched Australian touring sides since the early 1960s my thoughts are that whilst they have typically been better athletes than their UK equivalents it's changes to the game which have increasingly allowed them to utilise this to their advantage. For example playing on mud patches in the middle of a UK winter played in our favour. The days of contested scrums and lumbering forwards also favoured us. Finally the introduction of multiple high definition cameras has seen the end of the brutal physopath type of forward which was also a great leveller.

Agree silver - international RL exposes gaps in quality far more than RU. The muddy pitches may have gone from RU, but the ability to play a forward oriented game and starve the opposition of possession means a team with relatively poor backs can beat one with much better backs. Can you imagine the All Blacks backs vs any northern hemisphere team at RL? Wouldn't even be close.

The problem is the Kangaroos are that much better than England, but in RL there's no way to hide the gulf in class. Oddly enough I do give us half a chance in this WC, if NZ can turn the Aussies over. They were looking really good until half time vs Tonga, and they genuinely have a chance vs Aus. Whilst on paper NZ are better than England, we don't have the same mental block with them - most of our players have played and beaten them before.

If the "best side" always won then we'd have a very boring sport.......2008 and the Kiwis had no right to win the game but they did.

Kiwis just like to be good at something - anything will do.
If the warriors ever win the NRL they won't shut up about it for 40 years or so.

I'm in Aus right now for the WC and it went pretty well in Perth yesterday, stadium was the right size so that just under 15k was a good crowd. Commentators here think it's all about TV: audiences for this have been strong, but it is at the expense of any midweek games. For us, for instance, this means we move on each time after just one match and wait until the following weekend for the next one.

However, despite the doom and gloom on here, there is one clear, logical reason why the NRL should embrace international RL with a renewed passion: they are in a bitter fight with AFL (Aussie Rules) for sporting dominance. the one thing AFL CANNOT offer is international matches. They used to try some 'hybrid' games against Gaelic football teams but even that was weird. International sport is always the biggest game in town and the NRL could win this fight for good if it encouraged it more.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/ ... -australia

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/ ... -australia

Australia isn't "obsessed by NRL". That makes it sound like it's football in England, which it isn't. I was critical of the Aussies for not selling out the England match, because if they can't sell out WC matches against England and NZ in stadiums that are less than 30000 capacity, then there's something wrong. But I think bashing the Aussies for not falling in love with the tournament itself is just ridiculous. I can understand why overall they rate and like the NRL or SOO more than the World Cup. That doesn't mean they don't want to win the WC or that they won't be interested in the semi final and final. I'm sure those games will have good attendances and good TV viewing figures. Let's be honest, a lot about the WC is contrived. Wales, Scotland and Ireland teams that barely contain anyone who has an accent from any of those countries. They're joke teams and it's no surprise that there's very little interest in watching them or supporting them.

The Kiwis are generally a nation that punch well above their weight in most sports....they're currently handing the Aussies their butts on the Basketball court, they own the bloodyslow cup, they are the #2 ranked RL side, they just held the #10 ranked FIFA side to a goalless draw, they have the americas cup, are pretty good at rowing, rally driving, the world endurance car title including le mans......

as for the Warriors......every comp needs their own version of Warrington. Next year it'll be us......

They are nowhere near being as good as us at Basketball, don't confuse the NZ breakers, a club side for the "Tall Blacks" their national team

Arguing about NZ basketball on a thread called depressing quite apt

AND neither Australians or New Zealand are better at Cycling Athletics, Rowing Boxing, association football and several other sports. and apart from maybe cycling their not even close. but they are better than us at RL and they like to keep it that way.

Hmm...
2017 World Rowing champs......Kiwis were 2nd on the Medal table whilst the conglomerate that is GB sat 8th.
2017 World Track Cycling, Kiwis got 5 medals, as did the combined forces of Wales, England, Scotland and Norn Iron.
In 2017 there are 3 world Heavyweight Champions....a Brit, a Kiwi and a loud mouthed Yank and Boxing is as bent a sport as can be.
Association football was created by the English, along with Cricket and Rugby (which we now refer to as Union)...and in the case of association football, England are indeed the better side.....whilst in Cricket, we're about to have the Ashes which sits overall as 32 wins for both sides and the last ODI World cup saw the final contested between Australia and New Zealand....and IIRC England have an Aussie Coach now.......whilst in Union, well, let's just say that the All Blacks have the last 2 world cups sewn up and lead England 32-7 with 1 draw and the Aussies lead 25-22 with also, 1 Draw.....and England currently have an Australian Coach after their implosion in 2015.
At the 2017 World Athletics Championships, the united teams of Wales, Scotland, England and Norn Iron got 2 gold medals, whilst little old NZ got 1.....if only Mo Farrah had emigrated here instead eh


The Last Basketball World Cup saw both ANZAC countries progress to the last 16.......Britain nor England, Wales, Scotland or Norn Iron even qualified.....I Golf Justin Rose was born in South Africa, but he is currently ranked higher than Jason Day who was ranked #1 at the start of the year but now hits a ball like me.....whilst in Women's golf, Lydia Ko flies the flag for little old NZ......
.....Speaking of women's sports (WORLD CHAMPIONS) , Netball (Australia) Union (New Zealand), Cricket (England) Rugby League (Australia) Basketball (Australia 3rd)..........So miles ahead in Soccer but either level or behind in most other disciplines and given the population of GB&NI compared to the ANZACS, that's pretty dismal really.....

Britain does have a handy Scottish Tennis player though....I'll give you that!

hmmmm

Cycling....Australia were far & away first at this years track cycling world championships with NZ just behind GB with the same amount of medals

Rowing.....NZ second, Australia third, GB eighth

Athletics....GB Sixth Australia Eleventh

Boxing.....who knows, who cares, a sport that the third world engages in heartily to entertain the first world


Association football....hmmm last two games we're running at a game a piece, i know one thing, the atmosphere at Aussie soccer games s on the premier league

you blokes have nothing

Hmmm. GB work around the Olympic cycle becuase how well they do determines how much funding they get. Just look at the previous 2 Olympics and how many medals GB won in cycling compared to Aus and NZ. GB pretty much treat the worlds as a practise event for the Olympics.

Cool story that.....but it doesn't change the fact that NZ finished with as many medals as GB and Australia finished first THIS YEAR and the claim was that GB were better than the ANZACS which they aren't...at a great many sports.
POPULATIONS 65,000,000 + or 28,800,000......and lest we forget who invented many of the team sports that your so :adequate" at now
Cricket Tests (3rd and we're coming into our summer now), ODI (below Australia) 20/20 (below NZ), Union (below NZ), League (below both ANZACS) Basketball (below both ANZACS) Field Hockey (below Australia), Association Football (12th





)

GB bumper stickers on cars stand got GETTING BETTER......

GB has won the davis cup more recently than Australia
England currently hold the ashes
The winner of the tour de france is British
The formula 1 world champion is British
The UK has 8 current world boxing champions.
And I'm not even getting into the last Olympic medal table!
I think our little island does ok on a global sporting level.

[urlhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_world_sports_championships[/url
Search for
1. GB/Great Britain
2. Australia
3. New Zealand

Well, it still lists North Queensland as the WCC Winners, not Wigan, so it's an unreliable source.

Anyone that knows anything about Cycling knows this is fact and not a cool story. Team GB cycling is all about peaking for the Olympics, because that's the be all and end all for those athletes and also has been mentioned decides the amount of funding. To push the point further look at how many medals GB Cyclists won in the Olympics last year 12 (6 gold) to Aus 2 mefals, just a bronze and a silver.
The Olympic medal table from last year speaks volumes, GB finished 2nd to the US with 67 medals (27 Gold ) to Aus' 29 medals (8 gold).
I remember the Olympics before that when Yorkshire alone won more Medals than Aus.

Just to add to the post by Moe syslak. In the Cricket Ashes, England have won 5 out of the last 7 series. A British bloke has also won 5 out of the last 6 Tour de France. Also the Uk has had the most F1 winners of any country at 17, 5 more than the next.

Got to

at the huge list up there, some serious cherrry picking going on. Some of the sports it's about what's happened this year, like Cycling & Rowing, some are historical records like in RU ( no mention of last years whitewash England put on Aus in their own back yard) & Cricket. The boxing for some reason is just about HW's, not the other weight classes & all the other World Champions GB has got.

Anyway how did this sport dick measuring contest even get started.