No crocker again, hearing some interesting rumours, Stuart, Ross and now Taylor with a broken collar bone.

Souths will be lucky to make the eight

Souths were hot in attack in the second half today but there was a lot of average parts to their game. The Warriors dominated them in the forwards in the 1st half. Their winning run was likely to come to an end but I was still impressed with the overall make of the Kiwis today. Souths to miss out on the top eight and NZ have a good chance of finishing top 4.

If he had put that final pass in with 5 mins to go NZ would have won that game. Souths did ok though and thought NZ lost their way abit in the 2nd half.

Go on then, share them.

Enjoyed the game yesterday, even though we lost.
Maloney was great at 1, and if I had to look for a reason for the loss I would have to say it's Manu Vatuvei's defence....or lack of it.

I have a theory, no proof, just a theory ........... the potential talented backs of the future are all playing football, instead of rugby, from a young age.

You know how at school there was one kid who was excellent at all the sports ..... well these are the kids who grow up to be the pro sportsmen. Back in the day, these kids, if they grew up in certain areas of Yorkshire, Lancashire or Cumbria would concentrate on their rugby. Nowadays in the UK, the big strong kid will still play rugby and turn into a forward; but the quick, lithe kid will, from an early age concentrate on his football, and be lost to the game of rugby.

The domination of football (especially the Premiership) in this country is killing other sports.

they will need crocker now taylor is out. thought colin best had a wow of a second half today, wish we still had him at hull

I don't, I'd rather get Luke Stuart back so Burgess can revert back to the back row.

Luke Stuart has been the backbone this season, they'll miss him heaps.

Could be a good off season if Crowe gets his man!

Unless Souths ditch the Sandow/Sutton halfback combo they'll win nothing. Having one inconsistent halfback you could possibly get away with, but far too often both of them disappear in the same game. They desperately need a solid organiser at 7 who can dictate the plays and the pace of the game and make good choices with attacking kicks. The outside backs aren't that great either - they look a bit fragile to me.

I agree. The Aussie backs are superior in speed, strength and physique to the UK produced players. Matt Duffie who is a promising winger at Melbourne is a former schoolboy athletics champion at high jump and 200m. This is one example. We will always struggle to compete against the Aussies as one sport does not dominate down under as it does over here.

On that topic I've said for ages that if clubs looked around they'd find plenty of athletic lads not competing in any sports at a high level at a lot of secondary schools, who could be channelled into league. Football is a drain but not of big lads over 6 foot who can run. The other loss is union as a producer of league threequarters - that used to be a massive source of league outside backs.

I think another problem we have is that when league gets hold of the few they get, they're often immediately lumped in as forwards if they're big.

Guess thats what you get when you sign a pommie Rusty.

You were warned.

Yeah, it was clearly all Burgess' fault that Souths failed to make the play offs. The bloke who plays near enough the full 80 minutes every game, never stops tackling, never stops running the ball in and - today - even had a crack at kicking.

How many Aussie props or 2nd rowers have played better than him this season? And do you think Ellis is out of his depth too?

The fact a forward is kicking the ball confirms it

<s>


Awww Rusty... WHY???!!!

Does it? Confirms what? That Burgess is to blame for Souths not qualifying? How??

I'd lay the blame at other places rather than souths pack.

the whole point of this thread was to find another way to have a dig at burgess

to those of us that actually watch the nrl we would nominate their terrible run of injuries as to why theyve missed the 8

burgess was hitting the saints forwards last night hard, one of the few who did.

anyone that bags burgess in the nrl just doesnt watch it

McKenzie in blame superstar English forward shocker...

Its so apparent you wish this guy was Australian, its bordering on sad.

So when Dave Taylor puts the ball on his toe and dinks it in behind the line with all the skills of a quality halve...

Yea, i'd hate to have a backrower in my team that has a kicking game. no really...