NRL 2007

[Jeffles]

1 from 5 in the tipping - thank goodnes the baby Broncos won. Throw me a friggin bone somebody.

Everyone who put up a serious post about multiple short term mergers/relocations is an imbecile.

And while we're at it, all this talk about the player drain in the NRL is starting to sh*t me. It is even infiltrating the more serious media outlets.

[Anthony G]

Northern pride would have to be the worst name they could have choosen
Just beats Queensland Roar for worst name award

Theoreticially, if say 3 more teams wanted to enter the qrl and all had impressive setups would the qrl expand? Or just continue to hand out the same amount of licences (11 at this stage) each year?




7/8 last week 1/5 this week!

[hot_dogma]

I wish Jamie Soward would bugger off back to the Eastern Suburbs B Team.

[IanRitchie]

1 from 5 in the tipping - thank goodnes the baby Broncos won. Throw me a friggin bone somebody.

Its a fucken disaster

[paul]

not really nrl, but anyway, if cairns do get admitted into the Qld Cup next year, they'll be known as the Northern Pride ffs this isnt rugby or soccer.

AND the winner is… Northern Pride.

That will be the name of the Cairns Queensland Cup rugby league team should the bid to enter the competition for 2008 prove successful.

The name and logo were unveiled yesterday by club chief executive Denis Keeffe at the Legends of Origin lunch held at
The Reef Hotel Casino. The Pride has not officially won the bid to enter the competition but Keeffe remains confident the
club will be a part of next season’s competition.

“The Northern Pride will represent this part of the world with pride and I think it is a wonderful logo with wonderful
colours,” Keeffe said. “It is wonderful for anyone who loves Cairns and loves rugby league.

“And I spoke with Queensland Rugby League on (Thursday) and I am just reading minds here but
I think they are preparing for us to be in the competition next yearand we are preparing to be there
next year as well.”

Inaugural coach Adrian Lam said exciting times were ahead and that the new franchise would
be modelled on the success of the Gold Coast Titans. He also pressed the issue that this club would
provide a real path for local juniors into the National Rugby League through its association as a feeder club for
the North Queensland Cowboys.

“We are only in the infant stages but luckily we have some great support behind this club and I am
so excited about getting under way and getting ready for next year,” the former Queensland Origin
captain said.

“It is going to be a lot of work but that is the exciting part, we want a very good team up here and
we will go about it the same way I guess as the Titans this year.”

also, we'll know by September 1 which clubs are playing in the QC next year. Unlike the NRL, licenses are handed out yearly.

THE QUEENSLAND Rugby League this week circulated entry criteria to the 2008 Queensland Wizard Cup.

Breaking with tradition and releasing details earlier than usual, the QRL has also pushed forward the nomination deadline to September 1, assisting clubs’ preparation for the coming year.

The criteria have been circulated to all existing clubs as well as the QRL Divisions, for the purposes of forwarding to interested leagues and clubs.

For the first time the QRL is also assessing the possibility of issuing three-year licenses to participating clubs, given they continue to provide sound financial details and meet the determined criteria.

What the f**k is wrong with sports administrators? Mackay better not choose a sh*t name aswell...

[Cheesie-the-Pirate]

It seems I chose a good week to forget to put my tips in.

Good game today and of course nice to notch up a win for a change. Despite not having his best game Hornby adds that little bit of flexibility in our ball playing ranks. We should see Gasnier return within the month, it will certainly be interesting to see how he slots into the new backline. Meanwhile, I'm loving our athletic backrow. If he maintains his form Creagh should be a bolter for origin next year. He's rapidly becoming a leader of the team. If we do sign Dell we could very well have an all ex-backline backrow including Scott and Creagh. It was also nice to see Young on the Sunday Footy Show, indicating that he should be good to go for next season. Hooray.

Saints crowds continue to be very disappointing. I was forced to park 10 minutes' walk away from the ground and was therefore hopeful of at least a decent turn up. Oh well. If someone can point out to me where the hell they can fit another 8k people in there I'd be much obliged. I'm tempted to blame the turnstiles but one assumes that the club would've figured it out if there were some gremlins there.

[steeden]

What the f**k is wrong with sports administrators? Mackay better not choose a sh*t name aswell...

pretty much locked in as Mackay Sea Eagles i think, as the mackay bid is from the Mackay & District Rugby League, whereas the cairns bid is backed by the same people who own the Cairns Taipans, which is why they're not going to be the Marlins (Northern Division name /Cairns foley shield team name)

[Anthony G]

Hell jsut put em both in to get rid of the bye
(11 teams atm but i hear aspley is leaving. Therefore add Mackay + Cairns to get a 12teams comp)

[Jeffles]

There is a lot of gloom and doom about the Rugby League media at the moment and many people are rebelling against new fangled innovations such as salary caps, rule "interpretations" free trade and a global open labour market. The Jets article I posted earlier was one of the better examples from this range of media.

The Sydney Morning Herald ran an opposing piece yesterday.

Oh no, the past is over
30 June 2007

CERTAIN scribes, far more erudite than the one whose words you've unwittingly blundered upon, have spent a great deal of ink this week wondering whither went League's Lost Heart. But we cannot find it: it's gone.

Some say it was left out the back of Johnny Raper's house, in that dodgy shed he and Changa knocked up one long, boozy weekend. Apparently Gaz, the elder, was on a nudie run back from the pub and got sick of the blood spilling down his chest and so he ducked in and stashed it.

Personally, I like to think Noel Kelly wrapped up League's Heart in a Pelaco sports shirt and left it outside the Channel Seven studios at Epping after a blue with the Moose one Sunday morning. Better that than Rupert Murdoch buying it, along with most everything else the game ever thought it owned.

Others claim League's Lost Heart was the one left in the Ipswich sheds one afternoon when coach Tommy Raudonikis felt compelled to nail one to the dressing room wall - unaware that a few blocks down the road there lived one particular flame-throwing redhead much better at motivational talks aimed at angry young men (for further, see Hanson, P, maiden speech, 1996).

And besides, all that blood made little Alfie Langer feel sick.

Tommy swears. And he also reckons it was an ox's heart, the very same one he'd sent his missus to the butcher to buy. But the Lithuanian Legend could well have been bequeathed League's Lost Heart: the real problem is he couldn't remember the next morning who gave it to him. And where the *&^% he'd left it. And where his !$#*%^-* smokes were.

If Tommy did have it, maybe George Piggins gave it to him. Piggins and Manly's Pommy forward, Malcolm Reilly, were disputing ownership of said organ one day at the SCG. They punched, elbowed, kicked and gouged each other almost senseless for the whole of the first half, ending up like a pair of extras in a Tarantino film. Back on after a break and a quick patch-up, they came face to face again. "Listen, why don't we just knock it off and play football," suggested Piggins.

"Sure," said Reilly, in an apparently genuine spirit of reconciliation - just seconds before he smacked one last Liverpool Kiss on Piggins's unsuspecting kisser.

But hearts and innocence, such as that for which Piggins was heartily punished, are not all that league's lost. In fact, so much of rugby league is missing it's a bit like Monty Python's Black Knight, asserting "tis but a scratch!" as his various limbs are hacked off.

So, for those worried about all that's been lost, here's a short reckoning … League's Lost Teeth: A toss-up between Greg Conescu's missing fronters, lost on the SCG one day after they were extracted by a flying Pommy elbow, and Garry Jack, who one day tucked three of them away in his sock against North Sydney.

League's Lost Finger: Plenty of builders and carpenters played without one - they don't rate next to Hoppa.

League's Lost Hair: Russell Fairfax, surely. With honourable mentions to Les Cleal and Kerry Hemsley.

League's Lost Gut? Bob O'Reilly.

League's Lost Soul? Did Kevin Humphreys knock it down to Murray Farquhar in a tight spot? Others claim it fell down the back of one of Arko's poker machines.

League's Lost Arm? Not lost exactly but the broken wing nursed around Redfern Oval by Clive Churchill couldn't stop him potting the winning goal from the sideline - good enough to get the Rabbitohs into the semi-finals.

League's Lost Memory? Plenty of honourable mentions there. Nothing's ever like it used to be. The past is, as the cliche goes, a foreign country. It's just that in the case of rugby league, it's like Luxembourg - much smaller and far less significant than you ever thought possible.

Have a look back at the glory days. Remember the great year Souths last won the flag? If you remember it, you probably weren't there - the average crowd for one weekend in June 1971 was 3287. Hardy souls, newspapers love to call them. In 1974, crowd figures limped up to just over 5000.

Rugby league was a stink-a-thon, a delight for photographers and headline writers ("Some play did manage to creep in," reported the Herald in May 1978). Sure, the fans loved a fight. But the cold hard facts - as cold and as hard as the benches at Pratten Park - is that there weren't that many ready to do the loving.

He does make a very good point. These halcyon days people look back on featured smaller crowds, more fighting and poorer fan amenities than what we see today. Sure, there ar elements that we miss (tribalism and tradition). Some clubs still trade off that (Newtown) but not one club would wish to return to the facilities, crowds or budgets of those days in their current competitions.

Even the Jets would not turn down the chance to get a better grandstand, more corporate boxes, and a ground full of advertising signage. We have a lot to be thankful for and some people seem to forget that. Even though I lament many of the things Rugby League has become, I acknowledge that it has made some excellent headway in many respects over the time I have followed it.

[Jeffles]

I hope the Chooks are happy with Mitchell Pearce after tonight because there's little else left in the cupboard. If Amos Roberts wants to kick a ball again, cut off his leg.

Thanks to the Bulldogs, my tipping score doubled to 2.

[IanRitchie]

I'm glad i was out and didn't see any of tonights game.

[steeden]

Why the fark are the Gold Coast wearing their home strip tonight? We had to wear that white and navy garbage in the first derby game because the maroon allegedly clashed, so why is it suddenly fine for this game?

I hate the Titans.

[steeden]

what a game.

[Cheesie-the-Pirate]

Why the fark are the Gold Coast wearing their home strip tonight? We had to wear that white and navy garbage in the first derby game because the maroon allegedly clashed, so why is it suddenly fine for this game?

I hate the Titans.

I would've thought that the blame for the Chess Pieces wearing their alternate strip would fall squarely on one Bruno Cullen, not Michael Searle.

[IanRitchie]