www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/leag ... 1c1ba.html not a fan of introducing weight based junior teams. RL is a gladitaorial sport. if you are too small to take the knocks dont play it. teaches the smaller kids a good lesson about taking on bigger guys he future of the nrl will be players of Kiwi and Islander background their genetic gifts makes it harder for others to compete and if the PI and Kiwis can get just half of these kids on board int. RL will be doing very well

www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/leag ... 1c1ba.html not a fan of introducing weight based junior teams. RL is a gladitaorial sport. if you are too small to take the knocks dont play it. teaches the smaller kids a good lesson about taking on bigger guys he future of the nrl will be players of Kiwi and Islander background their genetic gifts makes it harder for others to compete and if the PI and Kiwis can get just half of these kids on board int. RL will be doing very well

Spoken like a true non-Aussie who doesn't have to hit it up against these guys every week.
This is more for the younger age groups.

watched the Storm v Reds SG Ball (U18's) couple of weeks ago and 15 of Storm's 17 were Polynesian looking kids. Fortuntely in our game a good small un can still be better than a big kid. Having said that it does seem that if you aren't 80kg+ by the time your 17 you are unlikely to make Toyota Cup.

The size issue is actually quite a big problem. The RFL have been aware of it inntheir schools programme where it was pproved that Kids who were born in september and the winter months were more likely to be playing the game in later years than were kids born in the summer months and this was due to size although they wre from the same age range.


Having big kids running over little kids does undermine attempts to develop skills for players. You dont develop much in the way of passing and kicking if the game is being played by 12 year old behemoths who get the ball and then just trample on the opposition. It is actually no good at all for either team.

That is why the author quite rightly points out the problems in skilful players coming through ( are the aussies really running out of skilful half backs).

I am sure those posters who run the amateur games can comment better but it it is an issue that needs dealing with

They have the same problem in union in New Zealand.I read a book called the Judas Game about professional union and a lot of the white kids are turning to soccer because they cannot compete.

If I was a Polynesian kids parent, I wouldnt be happy at sending, say, my 12 year old kid to play against a load of 16 year olds.

Age 12, the girls are usually bigger than the boys, let them play against them. It is a difficult one though because a 12 year old playing against say 14 or 15 year olds could end up being a fantastic player.

too small to hit it up go and play something else

no place to hide in RL, maybe they can play touch footy or something

you do wonder if we'll see the likes of Kimmorley, Campbell, Cronk, Sandow etc in the future? Having said that I watch a bit of Jnr RL here and the half backs and hookers are still generally the small white kids whilst the polynesians fill the forwards and outside backs now.

yeah theyll be fine

kids who cant tackle big polynesians arent suited for the nrl anyway because its going to be dominated with these kind of players so they might as well get used to it

I think a similar argument is going on in Rah Rah as well. Possibly even worse for them, because part of RU's appeal was that all shapes and sizes could play, from the fast thin kid to the lad who was built like a Portaloo. The pro era has changed all that, and it's feeding down into the juniors.

I guess that has probably been an issue in RL for a long time, but the specific demographics of the sport down under are causing this to be considered.

I'm not 100% convinced (I know nothing about junior RL) at all, but if there's a problem, it makes sense to at least consider a suggested solution.

I don't think you quite realise the extent to which the physical side of the game puts kids off. Kids who could with a bit of nurturing of their confidence turn out to be very good players. Even if they don't turn out to be players they've been kept in the sport and are more likely to at least be fans of the game and attend matches that if they had been lost to the sport at a young age.

Couple of points.

The best tackler on my son's U'14s team is the smallest (by some way!) boy on the team. So being of smaller stature doesn't always put kids off.

Likewise, my son is one of the biggest and fastest and plays a year above his age - he is of maori stock - but you wouldn't put him down as the youngest on the pitch. However, he also turns up for every training session and works hard to improve his skills. I have no doubt that playing above his age has improved him a lot more than if he played in his own age group. Natural size and strength can only take you so far. Big kids with no talent soon get found out on a rugby pitch.

I personally don't believe that they should introduce weight divisions and should keep to the current age-related rules.

I have seen kids including (this Sunday) who are well over 6ft and probably around 18+ stone playing in the U18s.

Is it fair? Maybe, maybe not. It's just the way it is. Most are Tongan or Samoan and not maori.

Dally should go and see some juniors play rather than quoting articles. He can get a true understanding of the size differences on offer.

i see the size difference in the nrl

good small players will make it to the NRL and the poor ones wont ...

just a fact that RL is a game for big kids that can run fast

much harder to play the game when your genes arent the right ones

kids might as well find that out when they are younger

they can still play touch footy if they want to play the game without getting hurt

The smaller lads need to be kept in the game until they develop, could you imagine the game without Cronk, Smith, Slater and the rest?

I've heard of a few kids going to AFL in western Sydney because of their parents fears of them getting hurt, one was the son of a Parra reserve player.

A fact known to the ARL Development people is that a lot more parents are getting their kids playing Assoc. Football as there is a greater risk of injuries with the larger kids in the game now.

Dally, the NRL is nothing in numbers compared to the juniors. Have a look at all the kids playing in Matts at the mo. The ratio of polynesian kids to non poly kids is only about to hit the NRL, so you're misguided.

In fact I told you at least two years ago that more than 50% of kids playing in junior reps was about to become polynesians. One more thing is that the NRL are looking at the number of officials from polynesian backgrounds, or lack of numbers being the case.

more like 65 - 70% of juniors are either islanders or kiwis

weight based junior teams is a laugh

if they cant compete with islanders then they wont make it in the nrl

as time progresses the nrl will largely be dominated with islanders anyway, they have the build for it

depends on what junior is for - if it is to develop NRL players then weight based stuff is wont work, non islander kids need to get used playing against the big boys

if its to get kids as fans of RL well maybe they can promote Oztag, mod league or something like that

the number of Polynesians and kiwis in both juniors and the nrl is only going to keep growing so weight based leagues wont achieve squat

soccer has always had massive juniors in australia ...

when they turn 16 they give up the sport

indeed RL benefits, Dean Young, dragons star was a great soccer junior, i think playing for australia

then he went to RL.

RL is a different sport to soccer .... if parents are worried about contact sports then theyll pick soccer

but little johnny might convince his parents he wants to play RL after watching benji do a side step on TV ....

It seems that virtually every poster in Australia has missed the point
1 If Rl just becomes about big kids running fast then the game will become pretty boring as there will be no room for skillds based players
2 The problem with big kids playing puts of smaller kids and their parents. Children develop at different rates and attempts to manage that as kids can only be a positive thing
3 If the demographic becomes purely polynesian will that affect the ability to market the game in Australia either because kids cannot identify with the players or more covert racism..

Some of the comments posted on here are just palin stupid eg if they are not tough enough let them go.

If all the kids are going to AFL and Soccer then that is a concern.

I dont know the solution but being aware their is a problem is a start. Unfortunately our posters on here cannot even do that.

yeah ,,,,

FYI RL juniors are growing every year ...
there have always been big kids playing RL, the smaller kids adapted or gave up ...
bringing in a weight based system is actually covertly racist ...

allan langer no problem developing as a fine RL junior and player being very small, he survived ...

this is a tough sport ...

and the number of islanders is going to keep growing ... what do you suggest down the track - one junior system for islanders and one for non islanders .... lol

Aussies couldnt care if a star is black, white or purple as long as hes talented

i mean most RL fans look up to benji and he isnt even an aussie

How many polynesians did Langer play against as a 10 year old? I can tell you, not many!

Reality is less than 0.1% of kids who play jnr RL will go on to play NRL. The other 99.9% play it and will continue to play it for the love of the game. This is a new issue in terms of the number of polynesian kids in the game in the last 10-15 years mainly due to the influx of polynesian families to the Sydney and Brisbane suburbs where RL is the number one choice.

Watching SG Ball this last two years it is clear that unless you are a pretty huge by the time your 16-17 you won't get into an SG Ball side in the outside backs or any forward position. The size of these kids is amazing.

I watch a fair bit of the under 16s and under 18s at Newcastle, and these days you see Islander kids who are fully grown adults at 14.
I was watching a kid named Tevita Pangai in the Knights under 16s the other week. He is 14 years old and about 188cm (6'3"icon_wink.gif and 95kg or so. He just pushes off 16 year olds like they aren't there.
Having said that, the secret isn't to stop those kids playing, the secret is to keep the door open to other kids who develop late.
The Knights also have two great second rowers in the under 20s, Carl Means and Matt Herman, who didn't get a shot at a Knights junior squad till last year at age 19.
I've seen 50 Islander kids in the last few years who were world beaters at 15 or 16, and were gone by 19, and i've seen blokes like Kurt Gidley not get a run till he was 18 and go on to play for Australia.
A lot of the non Islander kids actually pick up their game because they have to play against these kids who develop very early, and then go past them when they start to develop a few years later.

That is the key we dont want to be putting people off the game so early on. If you have not made up for it by the age of 20 you probably never will. You dont want kids giving up at 14 because they think i will never compete with Greg Inglis