State of origin expansion

[Sports Prophet]

2 hours ago, Rupert Prince said:

With so many Islanders playing for Origin and qualifying for their own nations...  what is the point of "Origin"?

I hear you. Just because they have islander names, doesn’t mean they are not Aussie or Qld/NSW.

11 hours ago, The Rocket said:

Couple of things, in the past we`ve had the Poms over or played the Kiwis after SOO and generally it has been a disaster, after three SOO`s they would pick the Aussie side, mostly from the winning team which would have all the SOO battle hardened combinations plus the players that just can`t be left out from the losing side, because they were so damn good, like Mark Gasnier coming into a backline that included Thurston, Inglis, Slater, whoever they played were absolutely on a hiding to nothing and that is what generally happened.

The Kiwis always go better against us if we play them in a series because they get to play together a few times, form combinations etc. More than ever a parallel Tri-Series, as you both point out, could offer that for them, i.e. to play a few games together before they played us, especially now that they would have some decent opposition so they could get that battle hardened edge that our players have after coming out of Origin. Crickey, we`re at the point now, where who knows maybe Tonga, Samoa, PNG or Fiji might beat them and earn the right to play us. It`s a great situation to be in.

Only one fly in the ointment that I can see, there are players in the Origin sides that are eligible to play for the Pacific Nations teams, and probably if those teams are going to be at their best they need those players in them like Daniel Saifiti, Staggs , if not injured, Xavier Coates and probably some of those other blokes of Islander origin. Having said that, I suppose after SOO those blokes could slot back into their respective `home` nations team, but they would be at a disadvantage against the Kiwi team, who of course don`t have that problem, unless your name is Tony Carroll, but anyway, there is no doubt there is the real potential as you point out SP and Jean, for a very interesting month of football , only question is. When do you play it ?

 

My thoughts are that the NRL needs to take a punt and bankroll the international series. Reduce payments for SOO to say 20k and also pay the same to rep players of NZ, Tonga, Samoa and other nations competing. The trade off would be that the NRL get all the profit from the international series.

[The Rocket]

11 hours ago, emesssea said:

Kind of ironic since doesnt New Zealand regularly beat Australia for the Bleisloe.....

As far as your comment about SOO ratings declining over the past 20 years, how do those figures compare to NRL ratings during that same time frame? Curious to see if it really is SOO or like with a lot of countries, sports overall are seeing a decline compared to x amount of years ago

Yes it is ironic, but the wallabies are in a worse position than the Kiwi League team now as they haven`t won the bledisloe cup for 18 years, at least the Kiwis RL have had a couple of purple patches, no coincidence it coincided when they had a decent half back, Stacey Jones and even more so Benji Marshall. It` s always been their weak point a quality half /five-eight combination, but the good news is that they seem to be now getting a bit of a production line happening and their pack looks awesome with players coming out of top-notch teams as well, like Harris-Fisher, Panthers the Storm boys, big Nelson and the Bromwichs, everyone is talking about Tonga, I reckon watch out for NZ next year.

As far as ratings figures I think League Tv figures have been pretty solid and gradually increasing over the last 20 years, it has been the big matches like GF and Origin where they have slowly declined, probably not getting those cross over viewers from other codes as much. Age demographics are a concern for both codes as well with young people just not prepared to sit down for 2 hours or whatever as Copa said too many other distractions. I`ve got two sons follow the League but are much more likely to stick their head around the corner , have a look and back to the playstation. My youngest says to me , `I`ll probably watch it when I`m old`, little ######.

If your interested in a sum up of yearly figures over on the `Cross Code(Rugby) Forum` on the `NRL is being decisively beaten by the afl in tv Ratings `thread (not as bad as it sounds) which is on page 1 about half way down on July 22 I made a post that summed up 2019 tv ratings, just to give you a rough idea of how many viewers we`re talking about. One last note League out rated afl in both 2018 and 2019 for the first time in about 5 or 6 years.

 

 

[The Rocket]

13 minutes ago, Sports Prophet said:

I hear you. Just because they have islander names, doesn’t mean they are not Aussie or Qld/NSW.

My thoughts are that the NRL needs to take a punt and bankroll the international series. Reduce payments for SOO to say 20k and also pay the same to rep players of NZ, Tonga, Samoa and other nations competing. The trade off would be that the NRL get all the profit from the international series.

Yeah I was thinking about that today, I thought it was 30k which is ridiculous, you tell me that those blokes wouldn`t do it for 10k and you`re right it`s just wrong that those other nations are playing for ###### all, I know they are doing it because they love their country but as some point they have to look after themselves. I think you`re dead right because it is an investment that could really pay dividends and set up the International calendar for years to come.

[Rupert Prince]

"origin".

I am a bit jaundiced about "origin", not least because when I say "origin" in quotation marks it's because players from say Tonga can be "origin" enough to play as Australians and play in "origin", but then can go and play for Tonga and not be Australian.

It's not unreasonable that someone from the State of Victoria could NOT play for "origin" but IS "origin" enough for Australia, whilst someone who plays for Tonga however is "origin" enough to for "origin" but not "origin" enough for Australia.

In the meantime dear friends we still find endless people who happily decry the concept of a Lancs/Yorks (or Pennine) competition.  If Australian concepts of "origin" were readily applied, SBW would soon play for Lancs and Folau for Yorks. (I did say I was jaundiced)

[unapologetic pedant]

6 hours ago, Sir Kevin Sinfield said:

With their 4 Championships, 4 Minor Premierships, and 3 World Club Challenge trophies they are doing ok. I think we put far too much emphasis on teams in new areas producing their own players. Be it Melbourne Storm, Catalans, Toronto, West Wales Raiders or Newcastle Thunder, obviously producing their own players is good but if they don’t it’s not the end of the World.

If they are a strong club with a decent following that makes them sustainable and that’s more important. Once the clubs been in existence for 100+ years you’d expect them to be producing plenty of players, but in the early days it’s not so important.

I partly agree with that. Only partly because however hard grass roots development may be, all experience shows that without it RL success at elite level is built on sand and can fall away depressingly quickly. And the Storm have been around for over two decades.

The Victoria Thunderbolts two junior sides go pretty well in the NSW comps. Much better than the WA Pirates. Their problem is that before their players reach those age grades, they learn their football in the local Vic comp. So they have to quickly make up a lot of ground relative to their NSW counterparts.

[unapologetic pedant]

5 hours ago, Sir Kevin Sinfield said:

What’s the point of Origin? It can sell out any stadium in Australia and gets the highest tv ratings over there for any sporting fixture. I’m not sure the point of origin can be questioned, players can qualify for more than 1 Nation, this is not headline news.

People qualifying for more than one nation, and the juggle between birth, upbringing, residency and heritage is a feature of the modern world. 

Origin is the anomaly. The fact that in RL an internal, regional contest has come to be seen as transcending international competition. Without Origin, or with a downgraded Origin, most Aussie born or brought up Island-heritage players would want to choose Samoa, Tonga, Fiji, Cook Islands.

Having players as QLD and Tonga, or NSW and Samoa, is just part of the anomalous place Origin has in RL.

[paul hicks]

14 hours ago, Mr Frisky said:

Yep I'm sure all those Chinese RL fans are putting a petition together right now to get it staged in their country......

its not a matter of Chinese fans its about getting media coverage  the old eyes on the screen  which encourages a growth in the global sports market instead of staying in the same shrinking markets  in Britain and not much real growth in Australia .

now that north America has been ditched were will growth of finance come from because sure as hell it wont be from England were investment has never happened  apart from the sky deal that lets face it was about eyes on the screen and not about growth of clubs .

 

[Cumbrian Mackem]

On 16/11/2020 at 12:07, The Rocket said:

If the Kiwis could match it with us on a regular basis there is absolutely no reason at all why it couldn`t be as big as the Bledisloe, we just beat them too often and too easily for the Australian public to take them seriously.

I`ve always said that if they would only put as much effort into their game as they do into the Haka they might win a few more. 

On reflection, that probably sums up our attitude towards the Kiwis.

The kiwis raise their game 9 times out of 10 in world cups and tri/4 nations. They just suck in Anzac test.

need more games played over in NZ too. Let the kiwi public of Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch see their superstars more often.

[The Rocket]

3 hours ago, Cumbrian Mackem said:

The kiwis raise their game 9 times out of 10 in world cups and tri/4 nations. They just suck in Anzac test.

need more games played over in NZ too. Let the kiwi public of Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch see their superstars more often.

Mate , I`ve no doubt  if the Kiwis were genuinely competitive with us they would be packing out stadiums in NZ, hopefully they can do well in the WC and bring that momentum home. we have such long domestic seasons here and in your part of the world which makes it difficult to fit in Internationals as well.

Speaking of superstars there, is a highlights reel of Roger Tuivasa-Scheck floating around, it`s worth having a look at.

[Sir Kevin Sinfield]

20 hours ago, The Rocket said:

Yeah I was thinking about that today, I thought it was 30k which is ridiculous, you tell me that those blokes wouldn`t do it for 10k and you`re right it`s just wrong that those other nations are playing for ###### all, I know they are doing it because they love their country but as some point they have to look after themselves. I think you`re dead right because it is an investment that could really pay dividends and set up the International calendar for years to come.

The players Union wouldn’t agree to lowering payments for origin, and rightly so IMO, it’s a massive money maker and it should be the players that benefit from that.

We need to increase the payments players receive for representing Tonga, Samoa, Fiji or PNG. England played Tonga in front of over 30,000 paying fans in the World Cup Semi Final, what did Tonga’s players earn for that? Something like $500, ridiculous.

Tonga v New Zealand would bring in the money and the players should receive a decent payment if they play in those games. Granted PNG v Tonga in Port Moresby wouldn’t generate the same revenue, but when they play tier 1 Nations the money should be there.

[The Rocket]

45 minutes ago, Sir Kevin Sinfield said:

The players Union wouldn’t agree to lowering payments for origin, and rightly so IMO, it’s a massive money maker and it should be the players that benefit from that.

We need to increase the payments players receive for representing Tonga, Samoa, Fiji or PNG. England played Tonga in front of over 30,000 paying fans in the World Cup Semi Final, what did Tonga’s players earn for that? Something like $500, ridiculous.

Tonga v New Zealand would bring in the money and the players should receive a decent payment if they play in those games. Granted PNG v Tonga in Port Moresby wouldn’t generate the same revenue, but when they play tier 1 Nations the money should be there.

I think they have already lowered it, possibly $15 000 per game, and with the downgrade in Nines broadcast deal with the NRL which was about $20m less per year from next year and considerably less this year, because they argued it was a diminished product, no crowds and a shortened season. Even though the NRL extended their Foxtel deal for seven more years they only renegotiated the remaining part of the Nine contract, 2 years after this year. There are varying opinions on this, Hugh Marks before he left said Nine doesn`t need League any more and said he was prepared to drop it, other media analysts  argue that if Nine want to maintain  its no.1 position it still needs a major code. Their plans with Stan and union would make you believe the latter. Could be possibly advantageous for League if Nine wants to have all the rights to League coverage, that would be the death knell for Foxtel, they may fight tooth and nail to keep League.

Getting back to your first point, SOO may have to take a haircut like every thing else.

The first players that went back to represent Tonga were Fifita and Tuamololo, both players who are probably financially secure, however if they want the young stars who might make the Australian or Kiwi squad to swear their allegiancy they are going to have to offer them decent money. They will need these players if they are seriously going to challenge Tier 1 nations on a regular basis. At some point the pull of playing for their country will only go so far, they have to think of their future. Otherwise you run the risk that these teams will only be full of players who can`t make the Australian or Kiwi squads.

[The Rocket]

On 17/11/2020 at 08:29, Sports Prophet said:

wrong post

Mate I`ve been going pretty hard on Origin the last few days, but you see games like tonight and with the crowd going off, looks like there`s a bit of life left in the old girl yet.