NRL Final; Rabbitohs Vs Bulldogs

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degsy said:
Any body bothered??
Rabbitohs for me, they've had their ups and downs and no win since 1971...on the bad side they have that bell Russell Crowe as an owner.
There just seems something of City/ Barcodes with a trace of kopite in their supporters, for all they play in Blue and White.

Can only watch the first half as it clashes with our game.
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Can someone translate this please, as well as the title of the thread...
 

Bruce Wayne said:
It's great to see the English so well represented in the final. Obviously Sam and George (in particular) are big players for the Rabbitohs, whilst James Graham won the prop of the year prize this season. Good to see.
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What criteria do they use to determine who wins prop of the year? I mean, the props in League don't prop - why is there a separate accolade for them? I'm not having a pop, its a genuine question.

I'm not a League fan and nothing in that youtube clip of highlights has changed my mind. Don't want to start a quarrel about the respective merits of Union and League. Each to their own. Will be interesting to see how Burgess will translate to Union and I think his chances of success are highly dependent on Bath taking things very slowly with him, which sadly they are unlikely to do!
 
Tree13 said:
What criteria do they use to determine who wins prop of the year? I mean, the props in League don't prop - why is there a separate accolade for them? I'm not having a pop, its a genuine question.

I'm not a League fan and nothing in that youtube clip of highlights has changed my mind. Don't want to start a quarrel about the respective merits of Union and League. Each to their own. Will be interesting to see how Burgess will translate to Union and I think his chances of success are highly dependent on Bath taking things very slowly with him, which sadly they are unlikely to do!
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It's a position, just as any other position is. Their role is very different though as the scrum is marginal in the general running of the game. The main role of the prop (in attack) is to get his team up the field. They tend to be very big with a decent turn of speed, with George Burgess a prime example of such a beast. Some also have a decent handling game, with James Graham an example of such a prop. Andy Farrell was also playing as a prop in his final season in league.

I'm in two minds about Sam really. The man is an undoubted superstar, and is an incredible rugby player. I'm just not sure how his skills can be utilised really. His game is based around action and physicality. He's always running the ball in hard, looking to punch through the line and offload, or he's looking to hurt the opposition with his defence.

Those things aren't really a factor in union. Compare Sam to someone like Brad Barritt, who will be a rival for a centre spot for instance.

Barritt makes around 10 carries per game for maybe 40 metres gained. Sam averages 16 carries this season and 144 metres gained. Likewise, he's averaging 30 tackles a game, which no player in the England team gets close to, and certainly not anyone in the backs.

Those are his strengths. He doesn't have any kind of kicking game. He isn't a playmaker. SBW did ok for the All Blacks because they play a style of rugby that is probably closest to league and regularly had support runners to get on the end of his offloads. England don't really, and still revert to 10 man rugby when the chips are down.

For what it's worth, I watch a fair bit of rugby, and for me, the NRL is the best competition and standard of rugby anywhere in the world. The intensity, the brutality, the skill, the flair. Unmatched.
 
Bruce Wayne said:
It's a position, just as any other position is. Their role is very different though as the scrum is marginal in the general running of the game. The main role of the prop (in attack) is to get his team up the field. They tend to be very big with a decent turn of speed, with George Burgess a prime example of such a beast. Some also have a decent handling game, with James Graham an example of such a prop. Andy Farrell was also playing as a prop in his final season in league.

I'm in two minds about Sam really. The man is an undoubted superstar, and is an incredible rugby player. I'm just not sure how his skills can be utilised really. His game is based around action and physicality. He's always running the ball in hard, looking to punch through the line and offload, or he's looking to hurt the opposition with his defence.

Those things aren't really a factor in union. Compare Sam to someone like Brad Barritt, who will be a rival for a centre spot for instance.

Barritt makes around 10 carries per game for maybe 40 metres gained. Sam averages 16 carries this season and 144 metres gained. Likewise, he's averaging 30 tackles a game, which no player in the England team gets close to, and certainly not anyone in the backs.

Those are his strengths. He doesn't have any kind of kicking game. He isn't a playmaker. SBW did ok for the All Blacks because they play a style of rugby that is probably closest to league and regularly had support runners to get on the end of his offloads. England don't really, and still revert to 10 man rugby when the chips are down.

For what it's worth, I watch a fair bit of rugby, and for me, the NRL is the best competition and standard of rugby anywhere in the world. The intensity, the brutality, the skill, the flair. Unmatched.
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It's quite a conundrum, and looking at the prior examples of League forwards who've switched to Union there aren't many examples of success. Presuming he never played Union in his younger days he will have no idea how to prop, so that's not an option. Lock maybe? His lack of kicking and playmaking ability will not be a problem there, and he'll get his fair share of ball-carrying and tackling. But how will he adapt to lineouts and scrummaging or rucking and mauling? The same list of problems can be attached to any idea of him playing in the back row.

You've mentioned him as a possible centre, but if he can't kick or act as a playmaker then he'll be a liability as a threequarter, and even if he's just used as a crash outside centre, he will still have to adapt his tackling technique - 90% of the tackles in that highlight video would get yellows in Union and if Burgess tackles in that same style.....

In all honesty I am surprised that League players bother switching over to Union. They tend to have very narrow skill-sets and in a lot of instances would appear, at first glance, to have a better chance of succeeding in American Football. Burgess sounds like he could be a decent running back, but the only League converts who seem to do well in Union are the winger/fullback types. Time will tell I suppose.
 

Tree13 said:
It's quite a conundrum, and looking at the prior examples of League forwards who've switched to Union there aren't many examples of success. Presuming he never played Union in his younger days he will have no idea how to prop, so that's not an option. Lock maybe? His lack of kicking and playmaking ability will not be a problem there, and he'll get his fair share of ball-carrying and tackling. But how will he adapt to lineouts and scrummaging or rucking and mauling? The same list of problems can be attached to any idea of him playing in the back row.

You've mentioned him as a possible centre, but if he can't kick or act as a playmaker then he'll be a liability as a threequarter, and even if he's just used as a crash outside centre, he will still have to adapt his tackling technique - 90% of the tackles in that highlight video would get yellows in Union and if Burgess tackles in that same style.....

In all honesty I am surprised that League players bother switching over to Union. They tend to have very narrow skill-sets and in a lot of instances would appear, at first glance, to have a better chance of succeeding in American Football. Burgess sounds like he could be a decent running back, but the only League converts who seem to do well in Union are the winger/fullback types. Time will tell I suppose.
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He certainly won't be a prop in union, or indeed a lock. The only positions I can see him filling are back row or centre. The thing is, the code doesn't really encourage hitting the line hard. You can't imagine this kind of run happening in union because the breakdown is different.



As such the collisions don't tend to be anywhere near as intense as there simply isn't the same momentum going into the tackle from either side. I think the whole thing about skill sets is massively over hyped. Rugby is rudimentary really in that it is a game where you try and run the ball over the try line. Union at times seems to have forgotten that, and is the worse for it. Most of the additional 'skills' seem purely to end up in penalties and kicks at goal. I'm sure scrums for instance are designed to do something in an attacking sense, but no one seems to know what goes on in them and a tiny proportion actually see the ball come out. It has become a sham.

I can only really see him playing at 12 (seeing as Tuilagi is nailed down for 13). Brad Barritt has been capped many times for England in that position and he's an incredibly limited player. He offers next to no threat in attack, either as a runner himself or as a creative outlet. Mike Tindall was pretty much the same. Very limited players in terms of talent. The only English (stop sniggering at the back) three quarter worth his salt is Tuilagi, and he's probably quite similar to Burgess, except Sam is bigger.

You suspect the coach wants to try and replicate the kind of centre partnership the All Blacks had with SBW and Nonu. That would seem to make the most sense. Hopefully Chris Ashton will make a return to the fold. He may be a little bit dodgy in defence, but his support play is fantastic, which is what you need when you have good off-loaders in the team.
 
Bruce Wayne said:
He certainly won't be a prop in union, or indeed a lock. The only positions I can see him filling are back row or centre. The thing is, the code doesn't really encourage hitting the line hard. You can't imagine this kind of run happening in union because the breakdown is different.



As such the collisions don't tend to be anywhere near as intense as there simply isn't the same momentum going into the tackle from either side. I think the whole thing about skill sets is massively over hyped. Rugby is rudimentary really in that it is a game where you try and run the ball over the try line. Union at times seems to have forgotten that, and is the worse for it. Most of the additional 'skills' seem purely to end up in penalties and kicks at goal. I'm sure scrums for instance are designed to do something in an attacking sense, but no one seems to know what goes on in them and a tiny proportion actually see the ball come out. It has become a sham.
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Come on bruce, I did say that I wasn't interested in debating the merits of Union versus the merits of League - let's not turn it into that kind of thing. I'll grant you that League fans don't have any idea what goes on in a Union scrum or what purpose a Union scrum serves, but let's just leave it there.

You're spot on about the breakdown being so different that it affects the way ball carriers and tacklers approach contact though. Dovetails into my earlier appoint about the very different tackling techniques.

Bruce Wayne said:
I can only really see him playing at 12 (seeing as Tuilagi is nailed down for 13). Brad Barritt has been capped many times for England in that position and he's an incredibly limited player. He offers next to no threat in attack, either as a runner himself or as a creative outlet. Mike Tindall was pretty much the same. Very limited players in terms of talent. The only English (stop sniggering at the back) three quarter worth his salt is Tuilagi, and he's probably quite similar to Burgess, except Sam is bigger.
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If Burgess can't kick or act as a playmaker, he won't get a look-in at 12 for England as long as Lancaster's running the show. Simple as that. Realistically, Burgess will have to learn to tackle as per Union laws and ruck effectively before he can play anywhere for England - let's see how he does for Bath before we start talking about him as an international. The criticism of Barritt is valid only insofar as comparing him to Burgess and asking can he do what Burgess does. The answer is no, and Barritt compares poorly. But you and I have already agreed that Union does not ask players to do what Burgess currently does in League.... Barritt is a creative, playmaking 12 (who played an awful lot at fly-half at age group level) and I suspect that if you watched him playing club rugby rather than international rugby you might see more evidence of that. Tindall is not a valid comparison because he was at his best ten years ago, and Union has evolved somewhat since then. (A closer comparison for Tindall would be Union-era Andy Farrell, who was basically a Tindall clone.)

Bruce Wayne said:
You suspect the coach wants to try and replicate the kind of centre partnership the All Blacks had with SBW and Nonu. That would seem to make the most sense. Hopefully Chris Ashton will make a return to the fold. He may be a little bit dodgy in defence, but his support play is fantastic, which is what you need when you have good off-loaders in the team.
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If the idea is to replicate the Nonu / SBW then Burgess would presumably take the SBW role - that of crash outside centre. Nonu is a sublimely talented inside centre who is creative, passes well off both hands, rucks well, mauls well and kicks better than most people realise. We've both agreed Burgess can't do those things (yet), so why would he be earmarked for that role?

I'm not trying to knock Burgess - he looks very good in League. I'm just saying that until he develops the union-specific skills, I don't see him being able to play anywhere but outside centre. At England level that means he's fighting with Tuilagi and Burrell for the jersey.

And Ashton isn't dodgy in defence. He's absent in defence. Non-existent. That aspect of his transition from League has been a massive struggle for him. Was he a reliable tackler in League?
 

cronullasharks said:
No idea, i'm not from the area though I have season tickets and go to all the games. Talking to a few mates last night who are also sharkies fans we were saying we'd love to experience grand final day just once.
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LOL! Keep taking those enhancing pills mate :P
 
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