No it’s not the latest blue movie release, but was just on the Wire site with a good thread on opposition players who you ‘love to hate’ for being very good and wishing they were in your team and yet finding them annoying , and that got me thinking about hard players

I know there are no soft men of rugby league, I only played for a couple of seasons myself when I was at Uni and that was enough for me. So respect to them all, but which players would you say, from Wigan or otherwise would you class as the true hard men of rugby league?

Also, are there less about nowadays, or not?

My starters for 10 – (watching since 1980) Dean Bell, Ian Roberts, Shaun Wane, Andy Farrell, Jamie Peacock

Past: Barry McDermott, Andy Farrell, Terry Newton, Terry O'Connor
Present: Adrian Morley, Jamie Peacock, Mark O'Meley, Keith Senior (I tried not to pick any proper houses but come on, like him or loathe him he's still pretty hard)

Brian McTigue.
If you ever get the chance ask Alex Murphy about Macs exploits v the Aussies on the 1962 tour.

On of my favourite stories about McTigue was in a test match when Mac, at a scrum got his hands up the opposing props jersey and grabbed handfuls of his oppos under arm hair.

Mac, ever so politely whispered into the props ear, "Do you want it hard or f***ing hard"

Graeme West, Kurt Sorenson, Kevin Ward, Greg Dowling, Ian Roberts, Mark Geyer, Jim Mills.

Warrington had their share of hardmen and lunatics in the 80s and early 90s. Kevin Tamati, Les Davidson, Steve Roach, Les Boyd, Des Drummond, Bob Jackson.

garry connoly for me tough as old boots that lad.

Shaun Wane, Kel Skerret, Andy Farrell & Terry Newton.

One great story I was told was about the 2nd row pairing of Nick du toit and Andy goodway.

Du toit would hit you all day where as goodway would hit you once and you would stay hit.

I've been privileged to see some real hard nuts of the game such as Billy melling , karalius , les boyd, Greg dowling, dean bell more recently Terry newton I could mention loads of others

Was the story about Ray mordt being wanted for virtually hammering someone to death in south Africa correct ?

Kelvin Skerrett

Super Kel. Just check out his highlights on youtube.

Ronnie Gibbs was always a favourite of mine. Read Paul Vautins autobiography and a funny story about him driving 3 other players to a match cross country, they got bored and started to flick his ears while he was driving, after a while he stated that if anyone did it again then he would stop the car and give a pasting to all 3 regardless of who did it. One of the players obliged and sure enough he pulled the car over ordered them out and smacked all 3 of his team mates.

Quentin Pongia was also a legendary hardman, you could tell when he signed with us his reputation was known amongst the players, nobody ever messed with him in his time at Wigan and when there was a fight it soon calmed once Q got anywhere near to it.

Brett Dallas, the hits he took and the way he'd run it up the middle, a joy to watch!

David Furner was a reputed hard nut. Certainly didn't mess about on the field

i always thought that Mick Cassidy was as tough as they come. Dont think i saw anyone ever get the better of him. Ian Robert hammered him with a monster hit in the Wigan v Aus game and Mick just jumped straight back up and played the ball. I could not believe that he just stood up as if nothing happened. You used to watch opposition forwards sucking it in when he was on the park because he would just beast them relentlessly.

Mean dean is an obvious one

Tallis, Paul Harrigan also

some may disagree, but in his pomp Stu Fielden knew how to put it about and i remember him leathering Jason Smith in the WCC for the Bulls. I also remember Barrie Mac coming a cropper after trying it on in one of there legendary scuffles. Brian Noble alluded to it in a post match interview saying somthing along the lines of "not mention anynames, but the master got shown up by the pupil today"

Furner and his "hard nuts" did their messing about off the field.

The fight between Gorden Tallis and Terry O'Connor in '97 was a beauty.

Whereafter Tez stated to the press that his wife ave harder punches.

Scully, i think it was in his contract to batter someone every match

What about Alan Prescott playing for about an hour against Australia in a test match with a BROKEN ARM because no subs in those days. Also a Gentleman by the name of William John Boston was no slouch if the occasion arose.

If we are talking fights the tamati v dowling in 85 was a blinder !

How about hardest half-backs - Andy Gregory would be a good candidate. He was more than happy to trade punches with the biggest forwards....

Shaun Edwards for playing on with a fractured eye socket & depressed cheekbone in the 1990 Cup Final was hard in the sense of brave & fearless. In the other sense, Joe Lydon & Andy Platt both showed it in that game, when they took revenge on Paul Bishop & Bob Jackson respectively for the challenge on Edwards.

Teams of the late 80's seemed to be absolute full of hard players, but to answer the original poster, I don't think today's players are any less hard, they just can't get away with as much stuff now that everything's recorded & pored over by the disciplinary committee looking for reasons to hand out bans. Watched the Manly game again recently, and about 60% of the players on the pitch would have received some kind of charge these days.

Rob Burrow, in the challenge cup vs hull

Maybe not 'Hard' in the conventional sense of this thread but I think Justin Murphy (formerly of Catalans) deserves a mention for what happened in our 30-0 home win in 2007. Won't forget how he ended up going flying over the advertising hoardings in the North Stand and landing back first on concrete and still managed to get up and continue playing.

Depends what you mean by "hard".

If you mean who would win a no holds barred fight, then I would say Ian Roberts or Des Drummond.

If you mean who would carry on regardless of any pain I would say Dean Bell

Agreed. Pound for pound the toughest guy I've seen play.