Re: Australian RL : Sun Sep 20, 2020 5:12 pm  

Watched in the days 50s60s when Great Britain were the tops was at Bellevue saw the great battle when trinity beat a full strength Aussie team gasnier and wells in the centres and a powerful pack hammered by turner and co nowadays the Aussies are fitter harder and faster than us I rate Johnston highly but all the aussie sides have big fast wingers and I feel he would struggle to dominate over there

Re: Australian RL : Sun Sep 20, 2020 11:21 pm  

it does help that we have so much money invested in the game over here - makes everything from the top down more professional on and off the field
I actually think super league is much more enjoyable game to watch in terms of attacking rugby league

but a good NRL game is edge of your seat stuff,and the build up in the media gets everyone excited ,its on the front and back page which you just don't get in England.

Re: Australian RL : Mon Sep 21, 2020 12:32 am  

Pecking order is something like

Football
Cricket
Horse racing
Golf
Athletics
Women’s football
Rugby Union
Darts
Boxing
NFL
F1
Snooker
Rugby League/ Netball =

Re: Australian RL : Mon Sep 21, 2020 2:08 am  

snowie wrote:

I chose to select a team to follow having no experience of who was the best side and chose Parramatta eels, the game the other day v Penrith Panthers was unbelievable while they was beaten the effort they put in was immense just wish Trinity would at least put half that effort in

I have been a season ticket holder at Penrith for the past 20 years and before that was a Cronulla fan for the 30 years I lived near there. Having previously watched the game in England for 20 years I always loved to see English players come and play here. Dave Bolton was the first player I saw out here at Balmain in 1969. He won the GF with them that year against Souths.

Re: Australian RL : Mon Sep 21, 2020 7:40 pm  

The Avenger wrote:

Pecking order is something like

Football
Cricket
Horse racing
Golf
Athletics
Women’s football
Rugby Union
Darts
Boxing
NFL
F1
Snooker
Rugby League/ Netball =

C'mon Avenger, surely crown green bowls comes after snooker !!!

Re: Australian RL : Mon Sep 21, 2020 10:28 pm  

Aussies took our game and made it great, its not just the sheer fact that they are streets ahead in in terms of the speed and intensity of the game but the tactical element is great to watch, some of the set plays are a joy to watch, we see elements of it over here with the likes of Saints at times but nowhere near enough. Must admit, as a few others have said until lockdown I never really bothered with the NRL, but I prefer to watch it anyway over SL now.

Re: Australian RL : Tue Sep 22, 2020 1:24 am  

For me it's a pity Sky won the rights to show NRL games because when Premier Sport had it they showed every game every week plus magazine shows like the Footy Show and Matty Johns show, both great to watch...so much so that my wife enjoyed watching them yet hates watching rugby or any sport. Everything about the game is better, especially the commentators who don't drool over which team is winning (unlike Terry 'state the bleeding obvious' O Connor & co) but give great commentary sprinkled with excellent one-liners.

Unfortunately, my NRL fix is now reduced to Sky deciding which games I can watch, usually Storm, Panthers or Roosters cos they're the 'form' teams.

Re: Australian RL : Tue Sep 22, 2020 5:37 am  

steve1g wrote:

For me it's a pity Sky won the rights to show NRL games because when Premier Sport had it they showed every game every week plus magazine shows like the Footy Show and Matty Johns show, both great to watch...so much so that my wife enjoyed watching them yet hates watching rugby or any sport. Everything about the game is better, especially the commentators who don't drool over which team is winning (unlike Terry 'state the bleeding obvious' O Connor & co) but give great commentary sprinkled with excellent one-liners.

Unfortunately, my NRL fix is now reduced to Sky deciding which games I can watch, usually Storm, Panthers or Roosters cos they're the 'form' teams.

Sky sports is now I believe owned by Comcast a north American media company, that's probably why we are getting less Aussie rugby and more basketball shown and even in depth analysis of behind the scenes basketball programmes, at least with Premier sports you got to see every game even at a cost which if you watched every game didn't work out that much.

Re: Australian RL : Tue Sep 22, 2020 8:11 am  

Been hooked ever since mid 80’s you could rent dvds from blockbuster in Wakefield used to train Saturday morning then spend the afternoon watching 2 or 3 games from a young age. My team are the Eels and would love to go over and watch them. Wakefield always seem to do well from Parramatta ranks.

Re: Australian RL : Tue Sep 22, 2020 2:26 pm  

try scorer wrote:

Watched in the days 50s60s when Great Britain were the tops was at Bellevue saw the great battle when trinity beat a full strength Aussie team gasnier and wells in the centres and a powerful pack hammered by turner and co nowadays the Aussies are fitter harder and faster than us I rate Johnston highly but all the aussie sides have big fast wingers and I feel he would struggle to dominate over there

He wouldn’t need to dominate over there as the team would be geared to his needs. Also that’s a myth, plenty of Aussie wingers are not especially big, many are like Johnstone, very fast and athletic but not especially physical.

TJ would rip it up in Oz if signed by a team that suited his style and avoided his only real weakness which is injury.