Sports Rugby World Cup 2023

Union has been on a slow decline for a number of years. Is this the year with a fairly poor looking All Blacks team and a strong Warriors team that we see a bigger shift in the codes?

It needs to happen for a few years before the bandwagoners become real fans. It's about getting children really into league so they grow up to be fans as adults.

Was at a game with 10 union kids behind me, they didn't know any rules. That has to change before they become fans.

Warriors management need to get players to go to schools and not just south Auckland schools and get league the sport to play or watch. Autex needs to support local clubs with some money so they can advertise and/or go into schools and run free programs.

Do all this and in 5 years league will be big.

The icing would be free streaming of NSW games.
 
It needs to happen for a few years before the bandwagoners become real fans. It's about getting children really into league so they grow up to be fans as adults.

Was at a game with 10 union kids behind me, they didn't know any rules. That has to change before they become fans.

Warriors management need to get players to go to schools and not just south Auckland schools and get league the sport to play or watch. Autex needs to support local clubs with some money so they can advertise and/or go into schools and run free programs.

Do all this and in 5 years league will be big.

The icing would be free streaming of NSW games.
The ARL and NZRL need to do their bit too..
 
The standard + 1 per game
The one in the ABs game is a clear example of how Union have got it wrong. You have to be technically perfect to avoid a card and it is pedantically only on random focus nes (it happens multiple times a game but only focus on a random one.
In this case the top of a props shoulder glances the underside of the opponents chin with him charging head first. Yes the taller should be lower but years gone by it’s a penalty max
 
The one in the ABs game is a clear example of how Union have got it wrong. You have to be technically perfect to avoid a card and it is pedantically only on random focus nes (it happens multiple times a game but only focus on a random one.
In this case the top of a props shoulder glances the underside of the opponents chin with him charging head first. Yes the taller should be lower but years gone by it’s a penalty max
And the runner dipped his head at the last second. Probably would have been a chest height tackle and the runner basically head butted his shoulder accidentally.

Weird game.
 
One thing the NRL should copy from the rugby world cup is the review system fornupgrading yellow cards to red whilst the player is in the bin and not during the following week.
I agree. I also like how RU has the use of mitigation so if the player is going down already for example.

They're making a right hash of it though it seems. How Tom Curry has got a 2 match ban (3 really, plus the full game he missed) I'll never know
 
Fiji 22 - 15 Wobblebies :ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:

Come on Wales, probably got some of that in me too along with the others.
Yeah, that was a great result over the worst-ever Australian team that I've seen at a Rugby World Cup. Eddie Jones was supposed to be the savior coach. But he doesn't have the right players for the job. They're trying to buy League players to help with getting wins.

Anyway, good job the Fijians. They deserved that.
 
Yeah, that was a great result over the worst-ever Australian team that I've seen at a Rugby World Cup. Eddie Jones was supposed to be the savior coach. But he doesn't have the right players for the job. They're trying to buy League players to help with getting wins.

Anyway, good job the Fijians. They deserved that.
Jones is well past his best and comes across as not all there upstairs. His only win since taking over has been against Georgia right?
 
I'll have another dig. England game was on in the background last night when I was getting stuff ready for work today. What I saw of it was dreadful, hardly any actual gameplay and what there was lacked basic skills like passing.

Being a league fan while watching that rubbish is a bit like following a religion and one day finding out you were right
 
Short Bokkie bombs with monsters charging the receivers for knock on or contesting seems the way Union offences are going for all teams.
Its a solid tactic in NRL too.
Broken plays create confusion and the unknown Bounce factor.
 
My rugby theory

Hypothesis – unless rugby heads down a different path, rugby players will keep getting worse head injuries, and rugby, as a sport, will peter out

Fact 1 – Rugby players are getting bigger.
More muscular. Fast twitch = faster. Weightlifters. Less aerobic. No more Michael Joneses / Terry Wrights / Josh Kronfelds. More Papalii’s, Canes, etc.

Fact 2 – Rugby has a problem with head injuries and is trying to clean it up via cards

Fact 3 – Rugby is a collision sport, and head injuries are more a function of steep changes in acceleration at collisions, than infrequent head highs,
i.e. making a countless tackles and hitting rucks at full pace are worse, over a career, than getting hit high on occasion (this was told to me by another parent (a doctor), whose mentor is a US neurosurgeon, researching brain trauma in the NFL)

Reasoning –
1. Dangerous play will keep getting pinged, slowing the game down
2. A game with more stoppages increases the value of bigger players that don’t need to be as aerobic as they did when the game flowed more
3. Bigger players = bigger, faster collisions = more head injuries
4. So perversely, the focus on pinging head highs is actually making the head injuries worse

It was often thought league used to be bigger players vs rugby. The sports have swapped places as league has been sped up and rugby slowed down (and body shapes have correspondingly swapped places). It only takes 5 mins of watching the RWC to see the stark difference from the NRL, in terms of body type and stoppages in play

Conclusion - rule changes that make the game more aerobic will reduce body size, which would be a more effective solution to brain trauma than pinging dangerous play
 
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