1. Samoa and the 2021 Rugby League World Cup
It has been apparent for at least 12 months that Samoa would be able to put forward an amazing side for the World Cup to be played in England in October – November of this year. In particular, the growth in stature of players such as Jarome Luai and Brian To’o, both for Penrith, has been spectacularly obvious to anyone with even a cursory interest in the NRL.
Regrettably, this enormous potential – which will culminate with the opening game of the World Cup against England at Newcastle’s St James Park ground on 23 October 2021 – looks increasingly likely to be unfulfilled due to the squabbling over the coaching position. Current coach Matt Parish has been at the helm for some eight years, during which time the Samoa team has increased in quality, while not attaining particularly praiseworthy results.
Certainly, someone seems to have had a word in the Johns’ boys ears as they quickly put their hands up to try and capitalise on the undoubted quality potentially available in the squad.
Media campaigns have been utilised to try and pressure Samoa to dump Parish and replace him with an Andrew Johns/Matthew Johns/Sonny Bill Williams coaching team.
Samoa frankly deserves a world class coach with proven success at the highest level. Neither the Johns (x2)/SBW or Parish ticket is likely to deliver that. Irrespective of who is chosen, the failure to secure stability in the coaching role threatens to derail what might be a truly spectacular World Cup bid from the island nation.
2. New Zealand Warriors home matches 2021
The NRL can largely thank the Warriors for the continued integrity of the competition over the last two years. Their combined sacrifice in playing “on the road�? for what looks increasingly like two full seasons is over and above what any other NRL team has been called upon to do.
However, their decision to play all of their home games in Australia this year – on the NSW Central Coast – is a mistake. Both A League and rugby union matches have been played by cross Tasman sides in recent weeks.
The New Zealand public fully deserve at least one home game this year.
The Warriors should play at least one match against the highest quality opposition available in their remaining draw at Eden Park before the end of the current season. There is little doubt that they
The Warriors should play at least one match against the highest quality opposition available in their remaining draw at Eden Park before the end of the current season. There is little doubt that they could draw a crowd of upwards of 40,000 (more likely capacity) – which would be a massive shot in the arm for the game in New Zealand right now. Potential choices for the game include opponents Penrith, South Sydney and Brisbane (always a big draw in Auckland). Other less attractive NRL games can be played at Mt Smart Stadium as per usual.
The Warriors need to give urgent consideration to reinstating their plan to play games in New Zealand by July of this season and need to think bigger in relation to the staging of those games.
3. NRL directives around concussion
The biggest (and judging by some media content – see later – the only) issue in the NRL at the moment is concussion and the NRL directives around contact to the head.
I have heavily criticised people in the past – the likes of The Guardian’s former journalist (the late) Frank Keating for example – for prematurely predicting the death of rugby league. As I have pointed out numerous times, rugby league is now 126 years old. The demise of rugby league has been predicted so many times that the frequent misguided calls around its foreshadowed end have become almost a parody of themselves.
Yet all collision sports especially (and contact sports broadly – including soccer with the heading of the ball), face a truly existential risk through the growing knowledge of concussion-related injury and CTE.
The law will (eventually) require an adequate response to the issue from all sporting bodies. Rugby league is no different. Contact to the head and neck must be eradicated. Rugby league will still remain possibly the toughest team contact sport on the planet and it can remain positive that future legal challenges will not bankrupt the game, as it will be able to demonstrate it has taken reasonable steps to ensure the health of its players. The health and safety of the players must be paramount.
4. Sam Walker – the influence of contract football
A little-known factor in the prodigious development of the Roosters’ Sam Walker is his heavy exposure to the out-of-vogue practice of contract football. Some of the greatest teams in rugby league history have played this style of football, yet not a single NRL team uses the techniques associated with contract football at present.
Walker’s prominent relatives, Ben and Shane Walker (father and uncle respectively), caused something of a stir among coaches when they adopted the contract football style with great success at Ipswich in the Queensland Cup competition from the 2011 season onwards. Put as simply as possible, contract football involves players forming a contract between themselves to keep the ball alive as much as possible. Players are encouraged to offload in the tackle and play in such a way as to ensure the continuity of the ball. This remains almost the antithesis of the structured NRL football which has been predominant since Phil Gould and other like-minded coaches perfected it in the 1990s.
The contract style of football encourages players to play what is in front of them and rewards a team-based approach to tactical thinking. It is a difficult style to play and requires tremendous fitness on the part of the players.
If the NRL wants to produce more pure footballers of the Sam Walker ilk, utilising contract football techniques at training – even if not in actual game play – will prove productive. It should undoubtedly form part of the junior training for all rugby league players.
5. Quality of NRL games – jury still out
There has been a glut of material written about the so-called quality differential between the best and worst sides in the NRL. Leaving aside that this is the essence of any league table-based competition such as the NRL, a fact which has somehow eluded some commentators, there needs to be a decent sample of games to properly consider this question. Frankly, ten or eleven games is not really enough.
The Broncos showed in their strong away win to the Roosters that the competition is anything but settled at this stage.
While it is difficult to see past the superb play and talent of Melbourne and Penrith at this stage of the competition, injury and suspension will play a key role between now and the grand final – especially in the current circumstances of the head high directives.
When compared to the likes of European soccer competitions, the NRL remains way ahead in terms of overall league competitiveness, leaving the likes of the much-vaunted English Premier League in the shade.
Yes, the percentages of lower sides defeating higher placed sides may be down a little overall but recent figures show that outside of the COVID affected seasons (2020 and 2021), the NRL has been substantially more competitive since 2012 than its main opposition in Australia – the AFL. The recent arguments in the NRL around this issue have lacked both context and analysis.
6. Media Coverage – NRL 360 as an example
While the vast majority of Australian rugby league coverage is slanted towards the negative, NRL 360 on Foxtel pay television recently took the cake by not mentioning any of the play at all during the most recent show following the NRL’s Magic Round. In a full hour of prime-time television covering Magic Round, Foxtel was unable to show a single highlight of positive play, while managing to show the head high tackles, sin binnings and send offs in their entirety. Not bad considering there were 24 of them!
While there was no doubt that the head high tackle directive was a major theme of the Magic Round weekend, it was typical of Australian rugby league for this to be the only issue to which 100 per cent of the available time on NRL 360 was ascribed – and that the attitude towards the games was a largely negative one.
Aside from the head high contact issue, there was some superb play on show at the Magic Round in pretty much all eight of the matches. And with 130,000+ in attendance at the ground over three days, and millions watching the TV coverage, rugby league missed yet another opportunity for self-promotion and expressed a renewed desire for self-flagellation.
