www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/ ... 5943405390

www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/ ... 5943405390

It's Britain you illiterate fool.

Also anyone who takes any notice of what Dean Ritchie says doesn't deserve the time of day.

What this tells me is that the writer and contributors don’t have a clue about the history of international Rugby League

The article tells us that “Since 1972, Australia and Britain have met 59 times - the Poms have won just 12 of those games!”

Then later, “The gap between the two nations widened significantly during the 1982 Kangaroos' unbeaten tour of England. Until that point, Britain had at least remained competitive”

Remained competitive? The overall ashes test results between Great Britain and Australia stands at 59 wins to Australia and 55 to Great Britain. Australia didn’t win an Ashes series from 1920 until 1950, I would say that is more than competitive... did Great Britain say that the bumbling Kangaroos were killing international Rugby League for the three decades they couldn’t beat Great Britain?

A well researched piece, I see.

11,000 fans to watch your world beaters..........I would suggest that Australia and their fans aren't exactly helping

But then the thickos claim that because we're not up to scratch the games are boring and one sided. Sydney-siders are just full of themselves. Had that game been played in Townsville or Brisbane there would have been a much bigger crowd.

Some are claiming it was a low crowd becuse it was raining

9 NRL teams within spitting distance of the game and yet only 11,000 roll up

Simple fact is that the marketing for the game was non-existant.....whereas in Wellington, there was a fairly big push over the last few weeks and therefore attracted a bigger crowd than the Crusaders managed in S14 all season.....

The NRL need to get a second NZ franchise in place as soon as possible......the 20,000+ at the cake tin on Saturday would all be back on a regular basis for decent League.......why not kick out cronulla...they bring nothing to the game

Sorry but what, exactly is there to disagree with? GB/England are not competitive. We haven't beaten Australia in a 'must-win' game for 30+ years. Our lack of competitiveness is not Australia's fault. They could relax the dumb Origin rule and let people play for Qld/NSw and not Australia, but apart from that (which really only affects NZ) the only thing that will bring international RL back to life is a competitive England.

Whilst we continue to have loads of meidocre imports and coach players so badly that our centres look like they've never even heard of setting up a winger let alone done it, we haven't had a decent halfback since Goulding, and our defence is torn apart by what are very basic plays, we'll continue to get the same results. And every year before the tournament starts we'll hear more nonsense about how great our pack is.

Loads....International RL was fine for 30 yrs when Australia had their (-)rses handed to them by GB and it is fine now. What the game needs is more than 3 countries with a chance of winning the RLWC.........and that ain't going to happen any time soon....and it's nobody's fault.
I would suggest that if you removed Australia, New Zealand and England from the RLWC you might actually end up with a pretty decent competition...and quite evenly balanced......in fact I would go as far as to suggest it......let the big 3 play their own tri-nations comp whilst the rest play in a world cup that any one of 10 teams could win.....and if the Australian Public can't be bothered turning up, then play it in the UK along the M62 corridor with tickets starting at 10 quid each.

11,000 was the total number of people who went through the turnstiles on the day. An eyewitness said there was never more than 8,000 for the Aussie game. The other 3,000 odd left after the Samoa v Tonga game.

And then people wonder why RL can't compete internationally with the other rugby code.........

to the more ignorant people on this thread, when england were a strong side ie 60s and before we would get test match crowds of 40,000 - 60,000.

the slump in interest here comes because you have been awful for 40 years.

getting 80,000 to a test in sydney is achievable for a strong england side

I love the "opinion" of some on here that if England were strong then 80,000 would flock to see a game.......it's utter tosh and furthermore, it is latent laziness on the part of whomever was tasked with trying to get 21,000 tickets sold to an international game.
Other sports have no problems selling every seat for an international.....regardless of the quality of the other team. Englands soccer team regularly play to full houses when they are expected to stuff some minor nation. Twickenham is packed for every game...........even Italy FFS......but when it comes to League...it's because they are too good for everyone? B0ll0x.......utter and absolute!
The AB;s are expected to do the Grand Slam on their northern tour........they will murder pretty much everyone, yet you try to get a ticket to any of those games.....or the Wallabies games. It's about marketing the events/games......we all know League is the far better game to watch........but it is stupid to just expect people to turn up.......Look at my club...No marketing for years with a population of millions to target and still crap crowds....you have to promote the game....otherwise you'll get gates like Sundays and the self titled troll patrol coming up with lame excuses such as the opposition were poor.......and it was raining

I really don't know, but has there ever been 80,000 for a test in Sydney at the SCG? Do you know Dally? Genuine question.

so on that theory Dally we should see 80K turning up for Oz v Nz matches given the competitive nature of the games between them in recent years?

Yes England are poor and have been for the last three tournaments, poorer than I have seen in 25 years in fact. To blame Sydney's (note Brisbane fans don;t have a problem turning out) apathy on how poor england is is very amusing.

Funny enough I was just looking on you tube at the 1988 Bicentenary test.

Have a butchers at the crowd and that was in the country's Bicentenary against the old enemy.

And the amount of kiwis living over here.

Favourite subject....

Whatever the thread, GF will get the rah rah into it.

The article is the usual crap from the journalist (used loosely) concerned.

It makes no real sense and is full of inaccuracy. Typical for the Tele.

The funniest thing of all is GF believes the IRB are some sort of model...

lol x 10

We will be fine without the rah rah. FIFA is THE model anyone in sport would be crazy not to look at.

Unless, we want the RLIF to be infested with "55 old farts" like the IRB, it has nothing of interest to anyone. Whereas FIFA is clearly the more professional organisation in every conceivable facet of its operations...

Shame union can't offer us a brass razoo.

Good on ya Darlin. The media over here can be riddled with this sort of journalism. See it's not just the Manly Daily.

I would never suggest otherwise. The Australian sporting press is a joke overall. Little better than Britain in many respects regarding rugby league. This was his intro to a blog on the 25th October... www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/ ... 5942998083 Same story. But it wouldn't matter at what point you asked him (Ritchie) that question during his lifetime. He would still answer the same way. He is an idiot.

I would never suggest otherwise. The Australian sporting press is a joke overall. Little better than Britain in many respects regarding rugby league. This was his intro to a blog on the 25th October... www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/ ... 5942998083 Same story. But it wouldn't matter at what point you asked him (Ritchie) that question during his lifetime. He would still answer the same way. He is an idiot.

winning 25% of recent games isnt competitive mate.

by competitive i mean every game stands a good chance of either side winning it

and a competitive england would be a bigger draw than a competitive nz

even though the later is realistically possible in the next 10 years

the scg has never held that much mate

65,000 was the most the SCGs ever held

going back to the 50ws/60s many a test match at the scg had more than 40,000 in

as i said before england have gotten massive crowds in the 60s at the SCG

your ignorance on the history of international RL is coming to the fore here.