England vs Samoa Series

[sam4731]

5 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I knownits tongue in cheek when people say they don't know there is an England RL team, but it's quite interesting if you look at the last 10 years (inc this year), how many games nations have played.

- England 40 games

- Kiwis 35 games

- Aus 29 games

- France 28 games

- Fiji 27 games

- Tonga 27 games

- Samoa 23 games

- Scotland 22 games

- PNG 21 games

- Wales 20 games

Against a backdrop of no willing (or capable) partners in the international game, we are still out there trying to stage international RL, World Cups, tours, whatever we can get. 

 

Last 10 years amount of matches:

England RU- 123

England Football- 125

England Test Cricket- 133

[Dave T]

4 minutes ago, sam4731 said:

Last 10 years amount of matches:

England RU- 123

England Football- 125

England Test Cricket- 133

This is missing the point. If England RL had strong partners locally and around the world who actually wanted to play test rugby, we would be way higher. 40 is a rubbish number, but it's way higher than everything else in RL. And as we've seen, teams are not that bothered about playing international RL.

My post is a comment on internal comparisons and challenges, not that others actually support internationals.

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

2 minutes ago, Dave T said:

If England RL had strong partners locally and around the world who actually wanted to play test rugby, we would be way higher.

Would we? I'm not convinced we would - unfortunately I don't believe there's the will from many of the key stakeholders in the British game to play many if any more internationals than we already do.

[sam4731]

10 minutes ago, Dave T said:

This is missing the point. If England RL had strong partners locally and around the world who actually wanted to play test rugby, we would be way higher. 40 is a rubbish number, but it's way higher than everything else in RL. And as we've seen, teams are not that bothered about playing international RL.

My post is a comment on internal comparisons and challenges, not that others actually support internationals.

How local are any of the teams that the cricket team play?

Also your statement is only stating the obvious.

If other teams were more willing to play test rugby we'd be able to play more games. Well obviously yes.

[Dave T]

00's - we played 47 games 

10's - we played 50 games

20's - we've played 16 games to the end of 2024. That's despite a cancelled Ashes, a delayed World Cup and teams begrudgingly prepared to play if they haven't got a wedding on that weekend.

The evidence is there that England want to play more games. We're the only one of the three major nations to play mid-season games, we've travelled to the other side of the world in-season, arranged a US game.

The RFL has many areas of incompetence you be criticised over - the desire to stage internationals is way down the list.

[Dave T]

13 minutes ago, sam4731 said:

How local are any of the teams that the cricket team play?

Also your statement is only stating the obvious.

If other teams were more willing to play test rugby we'd be able to play more games. Well obviously yes.

That's why my sentence stated and around the world. England football have loads of games against European nations regularly, and RU have Home Nations, France and Italy to play. Plus teams in other parts of the world will happily travel and host too. We have neither of things.

[sam4731]

7 minutes ago, Dave T said:

That's why my sentence stated and around the world. England football have loads of games against European nations regularly, and RU have Home Nations, France and Italy to play. Plus teams in other parts of the world will happily travel and host too. We have neither of things.

I do agree that the desire to play international RL is fairly strong in England. The only problem is that we're not willing to help out the development of RL in the NH. Time after time we penalise Catalans and TO in one way or another. We do nothing to support tremendous potential in Wales and we pretend that the rest of Europe doesn't exist.

Say what you will about the NRL and their attitude to the international game but the success of the Pacific islands is purely down to them.

Edited October 6 by sam4731

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, sam4731 said:

I do agree that the desire to play international RL is fairly strong in England. The only problem is that we're not willing to help out the development of RL in the NH. Time after time we penalise Catalans and TO in one way or another. We do nothing to support tremendous potential in Wales and we pretend that the rest of Europe doesn't exist.

Say what you will about the NRL and their attitude to the international game but the success of the Pacific islands is purely down to them.

Hmm. I think your last paragraph is extremely generous to the NRL. The heritage players are extremely strong for the PI teams. That is the key difference at play here.

[sam4731]

2 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Hmm. I think your last paragraph is extremely generous to the NRL. The heritage players are extremely strong for the PI teams. That is the key difference at play here.

So Wales, Scotland and Ireland should be at a similar level to Samoa, Tonga and Fiji?

[Dave T]

3 minutes ago, sam4731 said:

So Wales, Scotland and Ireland should be at a similar level to Samoa, Tonga and Fiji?

I'm not sure why you struggle to understand my point that the heritage players available to Tonga and Samoa has been by far the biggest factor at play here. They are of a far higher level than the other teams named.

For a while the commitment from the NRal was staging a game. Sometimes a triple header. But the PI teams generally played fewer games than the European teams who also used heritage players.

There aren't world class players from Scotland and Ireland running round playing RL like there are form the PI nations.

[Bedfordshire Bronco]

11 hours ago, Dave T said:

I don't see any reason why we would get a lower crowd than last years game .

I went to the Tongan series games at Saints and Huddy and the match day experience was awful.... Not even the usual burger and chip vans outside the ground at Huddy 

There may be plenty of people put off by that experience for the Samoa games.....I swore I was one of them until biking my hotel and ticket recently

I'm not saying I'm expecting a Super Bowl style event but maybe something approaching a normal SL match day experience would be the least to expect .... Like for example the normal food vans etc 

[Dave T]

7 hours ago, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

I went to the Tongan series games at Saints and Huddy and the match day experience was awful.... Not even the usual burger and chip vans outside the ground at Huddy 

There may be plenty of people put off by that experience for the Samoa games.....I swore I was one of them until biking my hotel and ticket recently

I'm not saying I'm expecting a Super Bowl style event but maybe something approaching a normal SL match day experience would be the least to expect .... Like for example the normal food vans etc 

Yeah, I'd agree with that being a risk. I didn't go as I had other plans and the WC bored me the year earlier. I'll  consider this year although my calendar is challenging.

[Sports Prophet]

On 06/10/2024 at 18:37, Abicus said:

Brian To’o and Izack Tago have both opted not to play in the end of year Tests the Sydney Morning Herald reports: https://www.smh.com.au/sport/nrl/ivan-cleary-reduced-to-tears-in-emotional-grand-final-presentation-20241005-p5kg43.html

That is really sad to hear. I can’t read the article and finding any free news hard to find.

Are injuries cited in that article?

It’s just another kick in the teeth for fans of international footy.

[StandOffHalf]

18 minutes ago, Sports Prophet said:

That is really sad to hear. I can’t read the article and finding any free news hard to find.

Are injuries cited in that article?

It’s just another kick in the teeth for fans of international footy.

Chammas doesn't cite injuries. To'o did pick up a leg knock though.

''Two of Penrith’s grand final stars are unlikely to play in Samoa’s end-of-season Test series against England in the United Kingdom. This column has been told that Brian To’o and Izack Tago have opted not to play. So too former teammate Stephen Crichton, who gets married the day before the team is due to fly out to England on October 18. Luai, who will join the Wests Tigers next year, is desperate to represent his country again and will play for Samoa in the two-Test series.''

So it appears that they have ''opted not to play''. Sanctions incoming, perchance? Heehee

[EastLondonMike]

23 minutes ago, StandOffHalf said:

Chammas doesn't cite injuries. To'o did pick up a leg knock though.

''Two of Penrith’s grand final stars are unlikely to play in Samoa’s end-of-season Test series against England in the United Kingdom. This column has been told that Brian To’o and Izack Tago have opted not to play. So too former teammate Stephen Crichton, who gets married the day before the team is due to fly out to England on October 18. Luai, who will join the Wests Tigers next year, is desperate to represent his country again and will play for Samoa in the two-Test series.''

So it appears that they have ''opted not to play''. Sanctions incoming, perchance? Heehee

On the phone to Mark Geyer on the best ways to loose your passport.

[UTK]

Despite turning up every few years with stacked sides Samoa has never really built the culture of consistency that Tonga has. Rather disappointing that this problem has come up again.

Admittedly it doesn't help that they have a strong Penrith contingent who have played as many high-level Club/Origin/International games as possible over the last 4 years.

Credit to the players who do choose to play in the post-season, every single player would have an injury at this point of the season that they could use to be ruled out medically so all players taking the field have made an active decision to do so.

[Sports Prophet]

6 hours ago, UTK said:

…

Credit to the players who do choose to play in the post-season, every single player would have an injury at this point of the season that they could use to be ruled out medically so all players taking the field have made an active decision to do so.

Yeah, I got to thinking, would we have seen the pull outs from Samoa if they were in fact playing in a four nations with Aus, NZ and Tonga. I suspect not.

It’s a long club season. I can actually appreciate a NRL players mindset being “ugh now a four weeks in camp and travelling to the other side of the world, getting paid pennies to play against England in two tests in front of smaller crowds than I am used to in the club game. My injury is feeling that little bit more debilitating now.”

Simply, the international game is too low profile and my guess is we can expect to see consistent withdrawals for NRL players to participate in cross hemisphere tours.

What comes first, chicken or egg?

I don’t think more internationals is the answer to our problems. I think the answer is higher profile internationals and less of them if it needs to be.

Give me Aus v England once (or twice) at a WC and again once (or twice) in a highly promoted Six Nations and until those fixtures are drawing 60k each time, that will do me.

Edited October 8 by Sports Prophet

[Dave T]

39 minutes ago, Sports Prophet said:

Yeah, I got to thinking, would we have seen the pull outs from Samoa if they were in fact playing in a four nations with Aus, NZ and Tonga. I suspect not.

It’s a long club season. I can actually appreciate a NRL players mindset being “ugh now a four weeks in camp and travelling to the other side of the world, getting paid pennies to play against England in two tests in front of smaller crowds than I am used to in the club game. My injury is feeling that little bit more debilitating now.”

Simply, the international game is too low profile and my guess is we can expect to see consistent withdrawals for NRL players to participate in cross hemisphere tours.

What comes first, chicken or egg?

I don’t think more internationals is the answer to our problems. I think the answer is higher profile internationals and less of them if it needs to be.

Give me Aus v England once (or twice) at a WC and again once (or twice) in a highly promoted Six Nations and until those fixtures are drawing 60k each time, that will do me.

There are a few problems with your last para. Firstly, I'm not sure just wanting 60k crowds means that it's the right number to demand. 

Secondly, to build up our internationals we do need to be playing more of them more regularly. We don't need to pretend that we are starting from scratch again and that we aren't good enough for the likes of Samoa and Tonga. 

Without people bring committed to growing the international game, we won't see Sanoa playing in events like the World Cup opener in Newcastle, or the semi final at Arsenal, or the WC Final in front of 67k at Old Trafford. These are the kind of opportunities that the international game in England offers.

The top level international games had grown to a decent level, where we can get 40k+ to a big international in London and 25k-35k+ in other grounds. These are events, and growing the likes of Samoa and Tonga into these sized events is part of the development now.

For nations that do not even stage their own internationals, the likes of Samoa have been part of some major international events in Oz, NZ and England. The players need to do their bit.

[Archie Gordon]

1 hour ago, Sports Prophet said:

Yeah, I got to thinking, would we have seen the pull outs from Samoa if they were in fact playing in a four nations with Aus, NZ and Tonga. I suspect not.

...

Possibly would. Some of them didn't look too interested in last year's Pacific Cup.

[sam4731]

7 hours ago, UTK said:

Despite turning up every few years with stacked sides Samoa has never really built the culture of consistency that Tonga has. Rather disappointing that this problem has come up again.

Admittedly it doesn't help that they have a strong Penrith contingent who have played as many high-level Club/Origin/International games as possible over the last 4 years.

Credit to the players who do choose to play in the post-season, every single player would have an injury at this point of the season that they could use to be ruled out medically so all players taking the field have made an active decision to do so.

Let's remember, Australia only started taking Samoa seriously when they put a full strength team out and got to the WC final. I'm sure there's plenty of room in the Pacific Bowl next year if England give them a good whipping.

[Mathius Hellwege]

6 hours ago, Dave T said:

There are a few problems with your last para. Firstly, I'm not sure just wanting 60k crowds means that it's the right number to demand. 

Secondly, to build up our internationals we do need to be playing more of them more regularly. We don't need to pretend that we are starting from scratch again and that we aren't good enough for the likes of Samoa and Tonga. 

Without people bring committed to growing the international game, we won't see Sanoa playing in events like the World Cup opener in Newcastle, or the semi final at Arsenal, or the WC Final in front of 67k at Old Trafford. These are the kind of opportunities that the international game in England offers.

The top level international games had grown to a decent level, where we can get 40k+ to a big international in London and 25k-35k+ in other grounds. These are events, and growing the likes of Samoa and Tonga into these sized events is part of the development now.

For nations that do not even stage their own internationals, the likes of Samoa have been part of some major international events in Oz, NZ and England. The players need to do their bit.

yes, yes and yes

 

That is why it was so such a monumental mistake to stage the historic Tongan Tour in three oversaturated poor M62 cities in a span of two weeks....and of course the learning was to play againsa Samoa in two oversaturated M62 cities

I could be crying all day over these unforced easy to avoid errors

[Dave T]

11 minutes ago, Mathius Hellwege said:

yes, yes and yes

 

That is why it was so such a monumental mistake to stage the historic Tongan Tour in three oversaturated poor M62 cities in a span of two weeks....and of course the learning was to play againsa Samoa in two oversaturated M62 cities

I could be crying all day over these unforced easy to avoid errors

I'm OK with Wigan and Leeds being locations for internationals, with London ideally. The majority of our most successful series have been NW, NE and London. It's a formula that works.

But had we been more bold, we could maybe have looked at 1 North, 1 South. Which allows for a larger Northern ground like Elland Rd.

Edited October 8 by Dave T

[StandOffHalf]

1 hour ago, Mathius Hellwege said:

yes, yes and yes

 

That is why it was so such a monumental mistake to stage the historic Tongan Tour in three oversaturated poor M62 cities in a span of two weeks....and of course the learning was to play againsa Samoa in two oversaturated M62 cities

I could be crying all day over these unforced easy to avoid errors

Yes, Samoan players must have seen that and gone ''Meh, I'll stay at home in Australia''.

Edited October 8 by StandOffHalf

[Dave T]

1 minute ago, StandOffHalf said:

Yes, Samoan players must have seen that and gone 'Meh, I'll stay at home in Australia''.

These places have been good enough for RL legends for over 100 years.

[gingerjon]

3 minutes ago, Dave T said:

These places have been good enough for RL legends for over 100 years.

You've noted elsewhere that we have fewer NRL/peak Aussies coming over for the club game, and now we have fewer international sides and players wanting to tour.

You can object to some of the stereotyping whilst acknowledging there is a truth to it.