240 replies to this topic

[barrowraiderskid]

England will win next years World Cup in a Canter at this rate.
The regular build up is starting earlier than usually it seems.

The Aussies are unbeatable we shouldn't even try we won't even get close. Maybe if we were abit more positive and weren't afraid of them then we could of beat them in a series in my life time. Kiwis got over it and now are reigning world champions.

[AndyCapp]

The Aussies are unbeatable we shouldn't even try we won't even get close. Maybe if we were abit more positive and weren't afraid of them then we could of beat them in a series in my life time. Kiwis got over it and now are reigning world champions.

I am not saying that.
The Australians are beatable as you say the Kiwis have done, but the Kiwis play a game similar to the Aussies as 99% of their players are playing in the NRL have been brought up as Juniors in Australia or in some cases born in Oz.
The Kiwis have beat Australia I think twice in around the last 20 games, fortunately those two games were major ones.
My point was..
Every year we hear about the English forwards are better than the SH forwards and yet they have been lucky to come off even at best against Oz at least.
Teams match up differently to each other, that has always been the case.
The Kiwi Forwards often seem to get the better of Oz
The English Forwards always do ok against the Kiwis.
Australia has always at least matched England in the Forwards (IMO)

The one difference is Australias backs are better than either Englands or the Kiwis and I do not see that changing anytime soon, more options, more players coming off the assembly line adds up to more wins than losses.

If I was an English fan I would want a couple of things.
A far better National Coach (the Kiwis did best when they borrowed Wayne Bennett)
A team that has a comprehensive tactical kicking game, with several quality kicking options (Another reason Widdop should be a certainty)
There are probably many more things but those two are a start.

Regarding the Forwards.
Ellis is on the way down, his best is behind him and has been at Test level for a couple of years.
Sam Burgess is injured a lot
Luke Burgess is only just an NRL standard player
Hock........ nah
Westwood is an honest toiler.
Morley should be retired.
Roby has never done a lot against Australia.
Graham is outstanding.

IMO

[AndyCapp]

Except when there is a neutral ref, the aussies kick off until he is replaced with one of their liking. They are ok with refs not sending off Tony Williams but not if it goes against them.

But as we know, the ref is irrelevant because they keep telling us so.

The Refs are decided by a three man panel in the 4 Nations.
I think if the game was referred the same in England, Australia and at Test level you would not see any issues.


Four Nations 2009
Oct 31st 2009 Game 2 England 16 Australia 26 S. Ganson Wigan
Nov 14th 2009 Final England 16 Australia 46 L. Williamson Leeds

Four Nations 2010
Oct 31st 2010 Game 2 Australia 34 England 14 T. Archer Melbourne
Nov 13th 2010 Final Australia 12 New Zealand 16 T. Archer Brisbane

Four Nations 2011
Nov 5th 2011 Game 4 England 20 Australia 36 H. Perenara London
Nov 19th 2011 Final England 8 Australia 30 M. Cecchin Leeds

Get a French man to Ref all of the finals.
Just make sure the Video Ref is not English eh..... that can be costly if your an Aussie.

[Johnoco]

All those refs were approved by the Aussies. That's not the same as bejbg genuinely impartial- they feel obliged to be seen as onside with them or else they won't get any big games.

And look what happened when the 'English' video ref didn't give them the call - he was verbally attacked by the Aussie coach.

[AndyCapp]

All those refs were approved by the Aussies. That's not the same as bejbg genuinely impartial- they feel obliged to be seen as onside with them or else they won't get any big games.

And look what happened when the 'English' video ref didn't give them the call - he was verbally attacked by the Aussie coach.

Not sure what you mean in red

Yes and that Coach rightly resigned / was sacked.
You take the good with the bad, I would prefer.
1) A competent neutral Ref
2) A competent English Ref
3) An incompetent neutral Ref.
4) A competent Aussie Ref
In that order.
Unfortunately we sometimes see options 5 & 6 incompetent Oz or English Refs.

Every fan sees a game from his point of view and there is always bias and prejudice over critical and marginal decisions.
Many Australian fans do not like several of the Aussie Refs or want them handling Tests or SOO for that matter.

Edited by AndyCapp, 04 November 2012 - 07:02 AM.

[gavin7094]

what would a second french team achieve? another retirement home for antipodeans thats what!!

Agreed. Having a second French team would be no better than just having 1. All it would result in would be a handful of the best of the rest in France playing for 1 club, thus further weakening the existing domestic competition.

In 2006 there were about 2-3 French full-time players. Now there are 20-25 French full-time players - how can that not be working? If there was a second French team in SL then we would have 40 full-time French players.

At the moment the French national side is like England V St Helens (minus Soliola, Puleutua, Hohaiha, Perry, Flannery, Meli etc.)

Exactly. So the idea of putting 1team from France in was always flawed. Either several or none.

Why did we do it?

How about because you have to start somewhere!

Of course. I'm saying not from there though. I've nothing against promoting the game in France. I think we've done it very badly though.

It needs more French players to be spread around more SL clubs somehow

Currently it's England v Catalans

Right! I totally agree with you. Rather than having 5 southern hemisphere players in each Super League squad, how about teams being encouraged to have 5 French players? That would be 70 full-time French players to choose from at a stroke and a constant production line of players. These players could then return to the French domestic league, further strengthening it, until eventually there are enough quality French players to set up several teams in an elite competition at the same time. Young players in France need to have a pathway. At the moment their choices are far too limited.

Edited by gavin7094, 04 November 2012 - 07:14 AM.

[Johnoco]

Not sure what you mean in red

Yes and that Coach rightly resigned / was sacked.
You take the good with the bad, I would prefer.
1) A competent neutral Ref
2) A competent English Ref
3) An incompetent neutral Ref.
4) A competent Aussie Ref
In that order.
Unfortunately we sometimes see options 5 & 6 incompetent Oz or English Refs.

Every fan sees a game from his point of view and there is always bias and prejudice over critical and marginal decisions.
Many Australian fans do not like several of the Aussie Refs or want them handling Tests or SOO for that matter.

I would be able to accept the concept of a non neutral ref (although it should be neutral) IF the Aussies didn't lean on them before or during a series. If they are as good as they claim, it definitely won't matter if the ref is good enough in their eyes.

[winnyason]

The game in test terms has gone backwards since catalans inclusion. Prior to this they lost 20 -18 to kiwis and led late in following years clash only to be overun 38 22. The domestic comp needs to improve.

[Northern Sol]

Spot on, injuries unbalance a team.


I can't believe in the last 31 years the French are no closer and they've a team in super league


I hate to say it, but Parisurtout is right, we need more teams.

Yeah but he thinks one of those teams should be one that he made up and doesn't exist. Don't give the troll any credit for stating the obvious.

[Northern Sol]

Burgess, Hall, Westwood, Hock, Ellis, Graham all could argue a place. The Aussies seemed incapable of tackling Crabtree and Robinson when they last played them. Luke Burgess seemed to easily compete in the NRL, and he was a worse player than Mossop, Harrison Morley Carvell and than Hill is now. If you put Tomkins in the Aus team would he do significantly less damage than Slater arguably not. Briscoe could be better than Aussie winger in a years time, Uate was playing for Aus last time we played them and he was gash during origin. Reed seems to compete in the NRL just fine. Then Watkins seems to have just 'it' he may be a good match with an injury free season under his belt. 9 6 and 7 they outclass us but that's the big difference IMO even though our number 6 plays with their 7 and 9 every week and doesn't look out of place.. We can beat them they arnt bloody supermen but we need to step upto there intensity level and we have lots of players capable. Although we were poor today.

Tbh your point seems very irrelevant as I'd of put 4 kiwi players in the Aus team which won the world cup, that's being generous also.

Yeah but one of them was Benji Marshall. Who is the English equivalent of Marshall?

[CANETMAN]

France beat us in 1982, 1985 and 1990 too. Don't listen to that BBC nonsense about 31 years. For much of the 70s, 80s and 90s they were quite competitive games.
They told us that putting Catalans in our competition would improve rugby league in France and thus their national team would provide more testing international competition for us. They lied.

You have to remember that on average only 6 out of the 17 in a catalans line up are actually french,batieri moved to OZ when he was around 7 years old (Tas son) i remember him playing for the eels jnrs in France at Pia a few years ago and one cannot count OZ players who have lived in France for 3/4/5 years.

The problem is that the only way France will be competative is with at least 1 more SL team however 3/4 would be better.

CM

[keighley]

I didn't see yesterdays match but I watched the England V Wales game. I thought the England team looked good in patches but I noticed they made lots of unforced errors, things like dropping kickoffs, unecessary knock ons. These were not important against Wales as England were so dominant overall but if they do things like that against the Aussies, they will punish each and every one, probably scoring or putting us seriously on the back foot. People are right to be optimistic about the level of talent coming through for England but we have in no way caught up to the Aussies and we cannot afforde basic unecessary mistakes which will give them an edge.

Such things are correctable though. Lets hope they are addressed and rectified before the WC

[Scubby]

I didn't see yesterdays match but I watched the England V Wales game. I thought the England team looked good in patches but I noticed they made lots of unforced errors, things like dropping kickoffs, unecessary knock ons. These were not important against Wales as England were so dominant overall but if they do things like that against the Aussies, they will punish each and every one, probably scoring or putting us seriously on the back foot. People are right to be optimistic about the level of talent coming through for England but we have in no way caught up to the Aussies and we cannot afforde basic unecessary mistakes which will give them an edge.

Such things are correctable though. Lets hope they are addressed and rectified before the WC

I agree entirely. You can't coach the natural talent that a player like Watkins has. You can coach him to defend though (which I hope they spend a lot of time doing over the next 12 months )

[keighley]

I think the intrduction lof the Catalans probably saved RL in France. Their league was in serious decline and attendances and playing strength were in serious trouble. No team got anywhere near the 9,000 plus average attendances the Catalans are getting and no French players were playing at SL standard. Now the French members of the Catalans team are. Young Frenchmen wanting to play RL now have an avenue to the top in Catalans. I think the numbers playing the game in France are increasing. Perhaps some of the members of the forum who know about the game in France can attest to the truth or otherwise of that.

Despite the setback yesterday, the French team seems better than it was. I think they failed to get out of their group in the last WC, so if they qualify for the quarter finals or, if they are lucky, the semi finals, then this will be significant progress. England, for all their recent failings , are still in the big three and deservedly so. The fact that England can still handily beat the French therefore is not surprising.

The French have to learn to walk before they can run. However the fact that they have been to two World Cup finals and won a test series in Australia ,long, long ago shows the latent talent available in France if it does not all go to RU.

[Old Frightful]

Had an enjoyable day yesterday, even in spite of the low quality standard and location of the game we attended.

Had a bit of a TRL gathering with myself and RoyBoy meeting up with John M at the station and TonyXIII (not at the station after missing his train ) at the ground.

Also caught up with HKR Away Days in the bar before the game. The future of Hull KR and RL in general is in good shape if people with his enthusiasm are involved with the game, top lad.

BarrowRaiders Kid might have enjoyed it as well as we were stood with Phil Hogan , who kindly gave us his expert insight into the game for the full 80 mins, even though he continuously regaled stories of the tries he scored against Hull FC in his career. Tw@

As to the on the pitch stuff, well we had a post mortem after the game trying to work out the way forward for England RL and, tbh, none of us could come up with any answers. Managing to get a team who could give England a good work out regularly seems too difficult. The Exiles concept was a reasonable idea but it'll never have the intense rivalry that exists between Oz and NZ. and those two nations are too far away to keep playing them regularly and I don't think there's enough money in our game for them or us to regularly fly to the other side of the world to meet.

Perhaps, as one or two have already suggested, if another French SL team can compete a la Les Cats then France might have a decent enough pool of players to challenge England regularly.

Sadly, I just don't see it anytime soon.

(Quick mention to the "none appearance of the day award" which goes to Mick Gledhill, how somebody of his stature can avoid being spotted by any of us when he was supposed to be meeting up after the game is remarkable.)

[Ullman]

Well, a delayed train causing a missed connection means that I'm in a pub in Selby watching this rather than at the match

Ouch! Bad luck.

I don't suppose it will make you feel any better if I tell you we rolled up 5 minutes before kick off and still got tickets for the East Stand.

[Ullman]

BarrowRaiders Kid might have enjoyed it as well as we were stood with Phil Hogan , who kindly gave us his expert insight into the game for the full 80 mins, even though he continuously regaled stories of the tries he scored against Hull FC in his career. Tw@

At least it won't have taken long.

Did you ask him if he got the bus to the ground?

[Old Frightful]

Did you ask him if he got the bus to the ground?

The subject of buses did crop up actually.

Funny that.

[Old Frightful]

At least it won't have taken long.

It didn't, however the topic of Paul Woods's knee in the Floodlit Trophy Final took up quite a bit of time.

He winced a bit when I mentioned it.

[JohnM]

Very enjoyable day, meet-up and game. Memories?
- chatting to the commentators from French TV at the station, spotted me from afar because I was wearing my old France replica shirt.
- lamentable language skills of the car park staff at the ground.
- obvious discomfort, trembling almost, of Old Frightful as he entered the precincts of Craven Park.
- realising that Roy Boy does actually know by name everyone who lives in Hull
- seeing HKR Away Days and realising that someone does indeed have a Movember 'tash better than my mother-in-law's
- efficient, polite and helpful stewards (no,really)
- sight of G Schofield holding court in the Corporate restaurant.
- the companionship and friendliness of FC and KR fans that gives hope for a successful merger.
- unique atmosphere of The Robin's Nest
- finally realising that Mick Gledhill is just a figment of our collective imagination
- realsiing that I MUST get to more games next season

Edited by JohnM, 04 November 2012 - 01:54 PM.