Sir Kevin Sinfield

The Four Nations was a brilliant tournament, we should of never done away with it. Bring back The Four Nations.

By scraping promotion and relegation and bringing back licensing, absolutely.

Brisbane should absolutely have 2 NRL teams, it’s a massive Rugby League city. Its ridiculous to only add 1 more club leaving an odd number of teams, just add 2 new clubs.

The two questions that need answering IMO Did we ask for a grant or did we only ask for a loan? Did we ask for more than £16M or is that all we asked for?

If an Australian international came to play in Super League and produced the stats Thompson has he’d be hung drawn and quartered by most on here.

Thompson simply hasn’t played well enough and has been dropped. Whether he’s named at 8,10 or 13 essentially his job is to run the ball in and tackle, sounds like a lot of people are making excuses for him. Plenty of players move between the NRL and Super League and struggle with form at first.

No I wasn’t. Some people are far too quick to call on young players been thrown in at the deep end (a bit like Wardle, Newman, Welsby for England) then for them to be thrown on the scrap heap when they don’t immediately produce, but I’m certainly not one of them.

Agreed but we should be trying to pick players that don’t get run over. I think Newman will play for England by the way, I just wouldn’t pick him at the moment, if he builds a load of muscle in the off season he’s a chance for next year but I think the 2025 World Cup is more likely for him.

Players need muscle, have you seen the fend from Staggs this weekend? If not search it.

Wardle, Newman and Welsby are all too lightweight for internationals at the moment, they need to pile on the muscle before they stand a chance of competing. Up against the likes of Latrell Mitchell, David Fifita, Viliame Kikau, Vunivalu, Sivo, Joseph Manu, Ken Maumalo, Corey Oates, Daniel Tupou and Kotoni Staggs how do you think these 3 would get on?

You pick the best players available, there should be no other criteria than that

With that criteria you’d rule out every player who’s already played at International level

I have no Leeds players in my England 17 above Harry?

The Raiders are playing Williams at scrum half. Luke Gale is probably the only other option there.

1 Tomkins 2 Makinson 3 Gildart 4 Farnworth 5 McGilvary 6 Lomax 7 Williams 8 T Burgess 9 Hodgson 10 Walmsley 11 Whitehead 12 Bateman 13 Thompson 14 G Burgess 15 Josh Jones 16 Clark 17 Widdop Squad Ratchford, Johnsone, Percival, Gale, Roby, Oledski, Sutton, Currie, McMeekan, Cam Smith. I believe Graham is retiring, Hill has been no good for years and Taylor and Watts look alright against rubbish teams but are not good enough to play at the top level. G Burgess has lacked some form but class is permanent form is temporary.

Cameron Smith is a brilliant back rower.

Are you seriously suggesting Adam O’Brien when we John Hodgson, Daz Clarke and James Roby? Hodgson has been one of the best hookers in the NRL for the last 5 years. Jake Wardle may have potential but he lacks size and physical presence at the moment, he’d be thrown around like a rag doll at top level Internationals.

I’m fairly sure Wane posts on here, he’s little else to do with his day, he’s a full time coach of a team that doesn’t train or play.

Or it shows some people are clueless

What about if he played Xbox?

Maybe this is the model we should look to copy in countries like Wales. Recruit union players to play high level academy rugby league at 16/17 years old.

If the grassroots is so poor in New Zealand, how do they manage to produce so many NRL and Super League players? It would be interesting to see the stats on how many players qualify for New Zealand, PNG and France from those competitions. Each of those nations has 1 fully professional club and its own semi pro/amateur league beneath it.

I wouldn’t rule out Hamilton on population alone. Townsville is similar at 180k. Most places over here are smaller Warrington 160k, Wigan 100k, St Helens 100k, Wakefield 100k, Castleford 40k. Hull have 260k but split between 2 teams.

I don’t know much about where has previously bid for a 2nd NZ NRL franchise, but has anyone shown interest in Hamilton? 125km from Auckland and a 25,000 council owned stadium in the heart of the city.

New Zealand needs a 2nd NRL team