I tried to watch it but gave up and watched Nanny McPhee. Much more entertaining. I had a disagreement with a southern work colleague today who said all they do in RL is run into each other, to which I replied that I would sooner watch that to two teams constantly kicking it back to each other and the game stopping for at least a minute or two every other minute.

Don't think Romans one to be watching X Factor to be honest.

An RU fan claiming that all RL players do is run into each other?

Has he ever actually watched any RU? Take ball, run at nearest player, lie down for a minute, let ball come out, repeat. Unless it's England, in which case the last word needs replacing with 'kick',

In fairness, todays game wasn't the worst I've seen, but England are a bit poo when compared with the other nations.

It is not a spectator sport though is it ?

How many people paid to watch the union today

Some of us know what your age is

and at your time of life you dont have forty minutes to waste your quite correct,

Thousands upon thousands. Baffling.

To be fair, it's not that baffling. The masses always follow things that are rubbish, just look at the album chart, film chart and TV ratings.

Not exactly high brow things at the top of those lists, just like yawnion pulls in the masses because most people are sheep.

If enough people say something is good enough, then others will say that it's good enough.

In short, it's how the NME stays in business.

What's the NME ?

Think it's still the Germans as far as you're concerned, Frank.

Warum ? Ich spreche ein bischen Deutsh aber nur ein veinig .

I still do not know. What is the NME ?

The [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NMENew Musical Express[/url - a publication about all the 'goings on' in the hit parade!!

Launched in 1952 from the merger of [i"The Musical Express"[/i and [i"Accordian Weekly"[/i (I imagine you were an avid subscriber Frank!!) - responsible for the creation of the UK Singles Chart.

You remember Frank - 78's, Al Martino, Lita Roza, David Whitfield, Winifred Atwell??

Thankyou Walt.

I was a big fan of Alma Cogan but nowadays

most pop music drives me crazy

I think some folk just need to accept that international rugby union is massive and has been for decades

We all know that John but we can't understand why. It is rather like 80000 people paying a lot of money to watch paint dry a few times every year.

Maybe the people who do it could explain. For example the sports commentators seemed to think they had watched a great game.

Not to those that go it isn't otherwise they wouldn't keep going would they.Theres obviously a brilliant rivalry between all the home nations which helps.It must also help being based in the capital rather that the backwaters of leeds

O/T why can't i see whos on line?

oh dear lord.......

is my youth really that far away??

It's just a different game. It's as easy to make a comparison with any other sport, Union is that different now.
e.g. Golf to me is an absolute abhoration. Millions love it. C'est la vie.
Union, it's an attritional territorial game of patience, build up, strength and power and secialist players where there is still room for the fat lad to make an impact on the game.
The scoring is different and has a different emphasis.
If you enjoy seeing games played out and decided like that... it's for you. If it isn't, it will comes across like golf does to me.
I like it, but nowhere near as much as league but so much more than the Ryder cup or the open/master etc etc. Now that will make me yawn.

When I played second row for Wath, I used to move that fast I was nowt but a ginger blur!!

I cannot see who's on line as well John.

Back to the main point,why do 80k turn up,easy really its a well organised competition that takes place year after year and is properly run by the governing body.

Us we seems to get together 3 weeks before, ask sky will they show it and have ago at it and when someone gets beat by more than 50 knock it on the head.

But hay ho as long as leeds win a world club comp once every 3 years everything is great.


These people actually enjoy the contact in there sport and actually the scrums[each to there own on the scrums I suppose but there rules have largely been unchanged over 100 years.

What about our sport,well we have rule changes every 3 months,if anyone watches the 71 cup final does it bear any resemblances to today sport? let alone going back 10 years.

6 tackles 5 ,3,turnovers 10 metre 5 metres subs on/off up /down turn it all around

And this sport we stand and chuckle at from afar with our 1400 fans grows season by season

good post jic

There are a couple of reasons why kick and clap gets the crowds it does

1) The games are generally closer and it is not decided in the first 30 mins like many league games. This has nothing to do with the skill on show as such, just that the 'tension' is higher. I rarely watch it to be fair, although the All Blacks and France sometimes can show a bit of skill.

2) Watching RU is seen as a 'class' thing, in an I am better than you way. This is why I dislike the game so much (bar a few teams/areas like Bristol or south Wales where this is not true). Old boys network and all that.

100% agree, if people dont like the sport then dont watch it! I love watching all rugby league but dont like watching speedway or the horses so I dont.