Sorry Sam no sympathy

[Dallas Mead]

9 minutes ago, Niels said:

Brave yes as he seems to have a fan club here who admire eveything he does.

However I suspect there are many like me who are doubtful because of his off field behaviour. 

Players such as James Roby and Rob Burrow are players I read and listen to as they are great role models with exemplary chatacters. 

 

Union is ACE.

[Davo5]

22 minutes ago, Niels said:

Brave yes as he seems to have a fan club here who admire eveything he does.

However I suspect there are many like me who are doubtful because of his off field behaviour. 

Players such as James Roby and Rob Burrow are players I read and listen to as they are great role models with exemplary chatacters. 

 

 

Edited June 30, 2022 by Davo5

[Dunbar]

1 hour ago, Shadow said:

The whole England team were ineffective, no single player was the cause.

That said playing Burgess as a brand new untested convert could potentially have led to issues within the team and his lack of experience, despite his undoubted talent, could have caused a point of focus for opposition attacks.

If there's a target for finger pointing it's whoever rushed Burgess into the England team before he was ready.

I don't think Burgess's transition to Union was handled particularly well.  Not least because his club wanted to use him as a flanker and the national side at centre.

I honestly can't think of a single Union player that I have seen frequently switch between the pack and the outside backs, never mind one that was less that 12 months into the sport.

The fact he managed to do this while winning man of the match awards at flanker and not looking our of place in the centre in a World Cup is testimony to his ability.

As for the Wales game.  England were poor but the bottom line is they were poorer after Burgess left the field and to go from 10 ahead to a loss is not the fault of the player substituted when 10 ahead.

[Man of Kent]

1 hour ago, Niels said:

Brave yes as he seems to have a fan club here who admire eveything he does.

However I suspect there are many like me who are doubtful because of his off field behaviour. 

Players such as James Roby and Rob Burrow are players I read and listen to as they are great role models with exemplary chatacters. 

 

Fair enough to some extent on the man but please don’t regurgitate what you’ve swallowed from yawnionists about the player on here. 

[StandOffHalf]

1 hour ago, Dunbar said:

I don't think Burgess's transition to Union was handled particularly well.  Not least because his club wanted to use him as a flanker and the national side at centre.

I honestly can't think of a single Union player that I have seen frequently switch between the pack and the outside backs, never mind one that was less that 12 months into the sport.

The fact he managed to do this while winning man of the match awards at flanker and not looking our of place in the centre in a World Cup is testimony to his ability.

As for the Wales game.  England were poor but the bottom line is they were poorer after Burgess left the field and to go from 10 ahead to a loss is not the fault of the player substituted when 10 ahead.

Asking/expecting a new convert to switch between the pack and the centre was a mammoth expectation indeed. Unfair and a folly that was unlikely to end well.

There was a big element in the whole Burgess saga that the RFU had backed the deal and almost had to fast-track him to show that they hadn't wasted money.

There are occasionally players who switch between backs and forwards in RU, but it is much rarer than in league where back-rowers often fill in in the centres (à la John Bateman).

Levani Botia is a centre who sometimes plays flanker. Another Fijian back who's filled in in the forwards is Napolioni Nalaga. The most famous recent example is probably lock/back-rower Radike Samo playing on the wing in a Rugby Union World Cup game for Australia. Kabamba Floors has played on the wing as well in South African club rugby.

It was certainly a tall ask to have Slammin' Sam playing in different positions for club and country!

Edited June 30, 2022 by StandOffHalf

[Niels]

3 hours ago, Man of Kent said:

Fair enough to some extent on the man but please don’t regurgitate what you’ve swallowed from yawnionists about the player on here. 

I understand your point. I did make my own mind up from the game. 

It seems a very sensitive subject for a discussion about a player's abilities. Usually fans disagree about players. However anyone who doesn't rate him seems to not be tolerated, which is ironic, or not so, given his past. 

I read Australian forums where fans thought he was overrated so clearly others have this view. But as they aren't English the threads  don't become obsessed with that game. 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 1, 2022 by Niels

[Niels]

5 hours ago, Davo5 said:

Couldn’t get to a World Cup never mind winning it.

Did you know that Wales beat Austria and Ukraine in the play offs to qualify for Qatar this year 

 

 

 

Edited July 1, 2022 by Niels

[Anita Bath]

3 hours ago, StandOffHalf said:

Asking/expecting a new convert to switch between the pack and the centre was a mammoth expectation indeed. Unfair and a folly that was unlikely to end well.

There was a big element in the whole Burgess saga that the RFU had backed the deal and almost had to fast-track him to show that they hadn't wasted money.

There are occasionally players who switch between backs and forwards in RU, but it is much rarer than in league where back-rowers often fill in in the centres (à la John Bateman).

Levani Botia is a centre who sometimes plays flanker. Another Fijian back who's filled in in the forwards is Napolioni Nalaga. The most famous recent example is probably lock/back-rower Radike Samo playing on the wing in a Rugby Union World Cup game for Australia. Kabamba Floors has played on the wing as well in South African club rugby.

It was certainly a tall ask to have Slammin' Sam playing in different positions for club and country!

Sadly Justin Holbrook made the same error at the Titans….switching 17 try Fifita to the Centres….and their season unravelled from there.

[ATLANTISMAN]

I managed to get through the entire rah rah 2015 world cup in England without watching one single game.

To this day i am very proud of this achievement

P

[Man of Kent]

6 hours ago, Niels said:

I understand your point. I did make my own mind up from the game. 

It seems a very sensitive subject for a discussion about a player's abilities. Usually fans disagree about players. However anyone who doesn't rate him seems to not be tolerated, which is ironic, or not so, given his past. 

I read Australian forums where fans thought he was overrated so clearly others have this view. But as they aren't English the threads  don't become obsessed with that game. 

It’s the scapegoating, chief. English yawnion has a superiority complex - that’s essentially why there are two rugbys in the first place - and the scapegoating of Burgess saw that come racing to the surface.

Some found it difficult to accept someone had come from league as a complete novice and played for England so quickly.

Some thought he simply couldn’t play; others, on some level, thought yawnion should be played by a better sort of chap than a big ‘oaf’ from Dewsbury.

That’s not to say I think Burgess was brilliant at yawnion, only that he did the job asked of him at the highest level yet was scapegoated.

Edited July 1, 2022 by Man of Kent

[Jim Prendle]

16 hours ago, Niels said:

The Welsh players didn't rate him. They said he made no contact against his opposite number Roberts, who was then fresh and able to dominate Burgess' replacement. 

 

 

So why didn't Roberts just dominate Burgess from the start of the game then?

A hugely flawed argument you seem to be fabricating.

[Jim Prendle]

7 hours ago, Niels said:

Did you know that Wales beat Austria and Ukraine in the play offs to qualify for Qatar this year 

 

 

 

I think many on here know that, but I don't think any of them actually care.

[stevecl]

Speaking as Wales RU - and RL - fan I was glad to see the back of Burgess in that game. He was effective for the time he was on but I never saw how Bath thought he was a 6. RU forward play is way too technical (NOTE : technical does not mean better it means different) to learn the game in a hurry. Had he wanted to stay he was IMHO definately a 12.

He wasnt well used by England which is odd as Lancaster is a good coach but maybe other pressures elsewhere.

There were some odd sound-bites at the time, there is a vid of him saying he "felt like a union player" and equally you can fine one saying "he always felt like a league player" but that may be down to his handlers at the time.

[Oxford]

3 hours ago, stevecl said:

Speaking as Wales RU - and RL - fan I was glad to see the back of Burgess in that game. He was effective for the time he was on but I never saw how Bath thought he was a 6. RU forward play is way too technical (NOTE : technical does not mean better it means different) to learn the game in a hurry. Had he wanted to stay he was IMHO definately a 12.

He wasnt well used by England which is odd as Lancaster is a good coach but maybe other pressures elsewhere.

There were some odd sound-bites at the time, there is a vid of him saying he "felt like a union player" and equally you can fine one saying "he always felt like a league player" but that may be down to his handlers at the time.

I think talking RU will just get the thread locked which was always it's fate. Someone will be affronted and complain.

In terms of Burgess it's not about was he any good or not and I'm not even sure that mattered when he was signed. As a success it would bolster their image, as a failure they would bolster the lack in RL players and as a signing he provided yards and yards of legacy media columns of propaganda and that was the real reasoning behind all this. He was essentailly a market place,  brand quality assurance chess piece.