Popularity of NRL in 2021 on Twitter

[Dallas Mead]

#2 in the whole country in 2021.  Sadly unthinkable in this country

 

https://www.news.com.au/sport/nrl/nrl-usurps-afl-as-australias-most-popular-sporting-code-on-twitter/news-story/a09da28a5386a8db7d9ef39d40679a60

[Sports Prophet]

That’s a pretty good result. More people talking about RL more often is a great thing.

[Mr Frisky]

49 minutes ago, Dallas Mead said:

#2 in the whole country in 2021.  Sadly unthinkable in this country

 

https://www.news.com.au/sport/nrl/nrl-usurps-afl-as-australias-most-popular-sporting-code-on-twitter/news-story/a09da28a5386a8db7d9ef39d40679a60

You would hope so - why would anyone in the UK be bothered about the NRL when we have 3 great RL leagues of our own? - especially after they destroyed this years world cup.

[Eddie]

12 minutes ago, Mr Frisky said:

You would hope so - why would anyone in the UK be bothered about the NRL when we have 3 great RL leagues of our own? - especially after they destroyed this years world cup.

Don’t forget the NCL. 

[Dallas Mead]

23 minutes ago, Mr Frisky said:

You would hope so - why would anyone in the UK be bothered about the NRL when we have 3 great RL leagues of our own? - especially after they destroyed this years world cup.

Totally missed my point.  I was celebrating my sport being big news somewhere and bemoaning the fact that it’s minuscule news in this country.

[Dunbar]

Unfortunately I only tweeted about the NRL about half a dozen times this year and they were all at Gus Gould and the NRL calling them out about the World Cup decision. 

As I have said before, on social media all interactions are good interactions for the brand.

[The Rocket]

13 hours ago, Dunbar said:

As I have said before, on social media all interactions are good interactions for the brand.

It`s a little hard to know with the NRL the exact nature of the tweets that have put it in this position. Adam Elliott with his `toilet trysts` and having a pash with his mate`s fiancee when his mate`s back was turned would be fairly typical of a large portion of Rugby League related tweets. I think I recall you posting once about how Mitchell Pearce was the most tweeted about person in Oz one year (2016?), I doubt that popularity reflected solely on-field performance. But as one T.V. executive told Roy Masters: " no other sport does soap-opera like the NRL."

Ironically though the amount of positive headlines and the interest generated regards Pearce`s move to France may have been partially a result of his earlier notoriety and the profile he achieved, so in the long run it was a case of as you say ultimately all social media interactions are good interactions. Oscar Wilde would agree.

For the defence I recall reading recently that the NRL Facebook page is the most visited sports page in Oz, and I believe that clubs like South Sydney, Rabbitohs and Melbourne are streets ahead of the other codes in terms of social media engagement, so its obviously not all bad and there is a lot of chatter about actual Rugby League related topics.

The other part of that survey that wasn`t mentioned was the top 10 most tweeted about Australian sports people, everyone one of them had an international profile. I know that`s a sore point for you, but hopefully in about 20 - 30 years when our World Cup rivals the union we may start to see a few Leagiues showing up on that list.

[Dunbar]

1 hour ago, The Rocket said:

It`s a little hard to know with the NRL the exact nature of the tweets that have put it in this position. Adam Elliott with his `toilet trysts` and having a pash with his mate`s fiancee when his mate`s back was turned would be fairly typical of a large portion of Rugby League related tweets. I think I recall you posting once about how Mitchell Pearce was the most tweeted about person in Oz one year (2016?), I doubt that popularity reflected solely on-field performance. But as one T.V. executive told Roy Masters: " no other sport does soap-opera like the NRL."

Ironically though the amount of positive headlines and the interest generated regards Pearce`s move to France may have been partially a result of his earlier notoriety and the profile he achieved, so in the long run it was a case of as you say ultimately all social media interactions are good interactions. Oscar Wilde would agree.

For the defence I recall reading recently that the NRL Facebook page is the most visited sports page in Oz, and I believe that clubs like South Sydney, Rabbitohs and Melbourne are streets ahead of the other codes in terms of social media engagement, so its obviously not all bad and there is a lot of chatter about actual Rugby League related topics.

The other part of that survey that wasn`t mentioned was the top 10 most tweeted about Australian sports people, everyone one of them had an international profile. I know that`s a sore point for you, but hopefully in about 20 - 30 years when our World Cup rivals the union we may start to see a few Leagiues showing up on that list.

The Mitchell Pearce stat was he was the most Googled person in Oz rather than most tweeted about but the point remains as strong I think.

Your last paragraph is fascinating.  I am amazed that the sport in Australia doesn't play the international hand far more; we know that it has Union completely defeated due to the size of the playing base and the popularity of the NRL but AFL remains a strong domestic rival and they have no international scene to draw on. I just feel it is an unrecognised strength for RL in Australia. 

[Sports Prophet]

1 hour ago, Dunbar said:

The Mitchell Pearce stat was he was the most Googled person in Oz rather than most tweeted about but the point remains as strong I think.

Your last paragraph is fascinating.  I am amazed that the sport in Australia doesn't play the international hand far more; we know that it has Union completely defeated due to the size of the playing base and the popularity of the NRL but AFL remains a strong domestic rival and they have no international scene to draw on. I just feel it is an unrecognised strength for RL in Australia. 

I can’t think of a more under-utilised sports entity in the world than the Kangaroos.

[The Rocket]

7 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

I can’t think of a more under-utilised sports entity in the world than the Kangaroos.

The problem is SP when we talk like that we are getting into the dangerous territory of treating our players like commodities, that is, expecting them to further our own agendas. We have to remember what we want from our codes sports stars might be completely different from what they want.

We want everyone in the world to see how great they are, how wonderful they are at our sport and spread the word. They are probably just happy to earn a million dollars and have people call out to them and pat them on the back when they go down to the shops.

Edited December 30, 2021 by The Rocket

[Llangennech]

1 hour ago, The Rocket said:

The problem is SP when we talk like that we are getting into the dangerous territory of treating our players like commodities, that is, expecting them to further our own agendas. We have to remember what we want from our codes sports stars might be completely different from what they want.

We want everyone in the world to see how great they are, how wonderful they are at our sport and spread the word. They are probably just happy to earn a million dollars and have people call out to them and pat them on the back when they go down to the shops.

How about trying to get more popular in Perth, Adelaide, Hull, Manchester and Newcastle before thinking about the rest of the world. 

[Dunbar]

1 hour ago, The Rocket said:

The problem is SP when we talk like that we are getting into the dangerous territory of treating our players like commodities, that is, expecting them to further our own agendas. We have to remember what we want from our codes sports stars might be completely different from what they want.

We want everyone in the world to see how great they are, how wonderful they are at our sport and spread the word. They are probably just happy to earn a million dollars and have people call out to them and pat them on the back when they go down to the shops.

We can't describe giving them more chances to represent their country as treating then as a commodity.  Across the whole of Sport, a common factor is how players see representing their countries as one the highlights of their careers and I am sure Rugby League players are no different.

[The Rocket]

I find this figure quite incredible but my son assures me that the NRL is very popular on TicTok.

 

NRL and TikTok partnership: An Australian first | NRL.com

"The NRL are one of the leading sporting leagues on TikTok, joining others globally such as NBA, NFL and UEFA, and have almost 900k followers,” added Lee Hunter, General Manager of Tik Tok Australia & New Zealand.

“TikTok has become a vibrant hub of sporting content for our billion users globally, including NRL fans looking for fresh content from the likes of Brian To'o, Kalyn Ponga, and Katelyn Vaha'akolo.