May 30 2007
Money Changes Everything
Well, I should take unpopular stances on rugby more often. I’ve never seen so many reader comments on this blog as I did yesterday. Maybe it was a result of Ufford making a cameo — people saw him here and probably showed up expecting to see more hot teenage pole vaulters. (Say, aren’t the Hot Teenage Pole Vaulters opening up for Arcade Fire right now? I hear they put on a good show…)
Anyway, most people seemed to push the idea that rugby league might be more fun to watch, but rugby union is more fun to play, because rucking and mauling is just fun to do. I think Andrew, though, had the most interesting comment:
The creators of Rugby League are people just like you who 100 years ago realised that to obtain payments for players they needed people through the gates, thus they needed a more attractive game. Rugby League is Rugby Union, just 100 years advanced.
Unfortunately the trials going on in South African schools is the IRB attempting to breathe life into a poorly performing sport. The one thing the ‘brains trust’ failed to do was provide adequate real game review of the sport as it traveled into professionalism.
Professionalism in football is a fun topic, isn’t it? Sure, we’ve had pro football in America for almost a century and pro soccer and rugby league in Europe for just as long, but several codes have just recently become fully professional. The International Rugby Board didn’t remove all restrictions on player payments in rugby union until 1995, and Aussie Rules was mostly a semi-pro sport until the Australian Football League formed in 1990. Gaelic football is still entirely amateur.
And as the song goes: mo’ money, mo’ problems. Remember when NFL players fought for free agency in the 80s? That was partly because the league was getting a lot more cash from TV contracts. TV money is creating huge gulfs in the Premier League right now. Some blame the AFL’s current drug problem on players (unfairly targeted or otherwise) with too much money and too much free time.
On the flip side, the AFL’s presumed drug problem isn’t keeping Irish footballers away. Ireland’s finest would probably love to play pro Gaelic Football, but they can’t, as it remains strictly an amateur code. This may explain why Tadhg Kennelly is in Sydney and Kevin Doyle is in Reading.
An aside: Chad Johnson of the Cincinnati Bengals almost chose Association football himself. He decided to pursue American football after high school, though, because in the late 90s, there were far fewer opportunities to become a soccer star in America. MLS was fledgling, and the only way to become a real star was to play in Europe, which he didn’t want to do at that time. So he chose to pursue an NFL career instead. I’d say that worked out pretty well.
Can you imagine Ocho Cinqo as the face of American soccer? My god, the goal celebrations would have been epic…
Anyway, it will be interesting to see how rugby union handles professionalism in the future. League is “watered-down rugby” in large part because it needed to put a product on the field that would bring more fans through the gates. Union has never really had to worry about that. Now it does. Will that change the way the game is played in the future?
RSS Feed
Union is just getting its feet wet. This results in the expected growing pains, however they are bouncing back resoundingly well (Including adding expansion teams to the premier Southern Hemisphere competition, European rugby flourishing, and the flow of players from Argentina making their name known on the professional circuit).
Also, Union has made changes to the game accordingly in an effort to make it flow better(Watch the SA vs. NZ World Cup Final from the 1995 World Cup, it looks like a different code) .
League has the polish and the promotions of a well oiled machine, and although Union is the most popular code, at the end of the day money rules everything, and Union is just getting used to that notion.
Food for thought: Wait for some of the bigger internationals coming around in Union (you’d be hard pressed to find a bar showing league), grab a seat/pint and watch the people who follow the sport pick apart the match (personal favorite: Ireland games at an Irish bar). The tactical element of the game is fascinating, and slowly but surely that bizarre code will start making a whole lot of sense. Ask them if they want the game to be changed, I’m pretty sure I know the answer. At the very least, you can feel ok about drinking heavily at 10am.
I think its that strategic element that might actually make union a more appealing game to Americans. Aside from the hits, I think American football’s appeal is the strategy. If you compare the two rugby codes, you can pick up on union’s strategy after watching a few matches. You might not understand it completely, but you can start to grasp it. Throw in good analysis from commentators, and rugby union can be understood.
Rugby league on the other hand has a harder strategy to figure out. I’ve watched this NRL season, and it still seems like run five times and hope for a linebreak. There aren’t as many set plays (like lineouts or scrums) as Union has. So outside of stretch the play to the wings, and the occasional cutback, the strategy gets lost on a typical viewer.
Alan, it is simple to say Union is easier to understand and has more strategy because it is ‘your’ preferred sport. I say that for most “union’ people.
You must do more reseaerch into the wider community and discuss latent or mid range and even new supporters to the sport and you will find they have next to no idea what is transgressing on the field. There are 48 rules at the breakdown lol!!! I would also like to point out, Union’s strong point is it can be very much a game of contested ball and adlib football. This is obviously in complete contradiction to having some sort of strategy when playing. Unless your refferiung to the age old strategy of moving the ball within kicking distnace of the goal and extracting a penalty? This years Super 14 had a score line of 27 - 9…not a single try just 12 penalty shots at goal.
As for League, I can be your complete opposite on this Alan, it has around the same amount of rules across the whole game that Union has at the breakdown. Surely this is a lead to something being less confusing and easier to understand? As for strategy, when you know you have 6 tackles with the ball you CAN apply strategy. You see Alan, in Rugby League there is an intangible play called attrition, it comes about at targeting some of your big guys at the other teams little guys and to that, you need to be able to move the ball away from them so you can come back to them. You may have guys who can’t defend well on a certain side so you target them, you maybe playing against a bigger team so you don’t put your last tckle kick over the sideline, forcing them to retreat to the ball without a breather. You may play in a bigger side, so you kick your last tackle option into touch and walk to the scrumm, giving your bigger guys a chance to get their breath. You may play against a team with an ‘up and in defence’ so you play two pass wrap plays, you may play a team with an up and out defence so you employ a face to out pass technique, you may play a team with a team with a slide and back defence so you employ a shift drop pass technique.
This is only the tip of the iceberg at the elite level Alan, one thing I can assure you, Rugby League is a sport based nearly on strategies and breaking teams down through collision. Rugby from my perspective is one very much about creating opportunitites from quickly recycled ball and playing what you see in front of you, which hopefully is less defenders as the are caught at the breakdown.
Don’t let old school teachings and classical conditioning (brainwashing) get in the way of you understanding and appreciating the sweet science of Rugby League as well as your favourite sport Rugby Union.
Hey man can u giv me sum info on the changes touch footy australia has made to make the sport more entertaining. Thanx man. Go the maroons!!
We weren’t ryan cabrera to mls her to do anything she wasn’t replacing for. Lossily dominant ryan cabrera images
godhead concurrently penal