I grew up loving both Rugby & League, League these days just bores the tits off of me and the commentary is getting more & more dire. I just can't get interested to watch a full game any more, let alone actually attend a match,where as the Rugby, I'm loathe to get up to fetch a drink or go to the toilet least I miss something.
It's a pity the media is so pro league, I think free to air coverage has a lot to do with it.It gives that game a massive leg up into the public psyche. The spider cam they used in the cricket & now in the league craps all over the rather over hyped ref cam. But I guess that's channel nines baby at teh moment.
I hope our game never sells it's soul entirely to the likes of Tom Waterhouse as they've done with league this year!
I grew up as a nsw schoolboy, all I EVER knew was league. State school I guess I'd better add. There might have been a few minutes at the end of the sports report on rugby, never really noticed.
The point being, there was simply NO coverage of ruby at all in any real sense.
Then when I was a teenager I ended up at a private school, all of a sudden I was playing this completely foreign game. And what's worse, they never taught me the rules! Aw man, I was forever being penalised as all I did was play league in a game of union.
'Of COURSE you gotta fall on the guy, how else do you tackle him' haha. PFWt, penalty, going off feet.
Anyway, still in those days there was no tv coverage at ll (talking seventies here) so kinda fell back to watching league. And IIRC there were some damned good games in league back then. I remember it was when the mortimer bros were running around with canterbury, and yeah they did throw the ball around, was good entertaining stuff.
Forward in time, and it was only in hindsight that I noticed the gradual change in my responses to the games, I used to watch the 'pinnacle' of league, the origin games. By that stage had already given up on the regular comp games.
I realised that I used to read books while 'watching' the games! I'd only glance up when a try was scored. It had gotten so boring so gradually that I never kinda noticed my changing attitude.
Then one day I must have caught a rugby match. As I said, had played it (sort of) but never had a chance to actually watch.
Man, what is THIS? Non stop, ever changing, enthralling. A THINKING game. Not going well in the scrums? Ok, stick to line outs. Get a penalty? ok, YOU choose. Not this one limited choice as in league, pack a scrum. Take a tap. go for a lineout. Whatever.
Not that you are interested in my epiphany haha, but there is a point I want to make. In my experience, it is all about exposure. I never really KNEW there was a game called rugby if you follow me. That's because I grew up in nsw, played league as all my state school fellows did, never saw a game on tv ever. (so that is one thing pay tv has done for the game)
And in a nutshell THAT is what the game has to overcome. MOST people when they come across different rules simply reject it. They do not want to take the time to give it a go. They just stick with what they already know.
I might not have made this post except for a curious set of circumstances I came across just this afternoon. I FINALLY made it out to the local rugby ground today, have been meaning to do that for a few years now. Quite enjoyed myself, even tho I think it was only trials of some sort. I dare say when the comp proper kicks off I'll be a bit more regular.
Anyway, the curious circumstance I spoke of?
I have already made the point that exposure has a lot to do with getting new people to the game. It was hot outside, so inside I went for the aircon comfort of the cluhouse.
Outside, thru the windows were the rugby games.
but what was on the big screen in the rugby clubhouse?
League games. Manly and brisbane was it? Then another league game. I mean who give a flying what it was.
I mean it is not as if they cannot play league game, of course they can do what they want, no real skin off my nose.
It was just that I was struck with what seemed to me writ large the essential problem the game faces, the constant overpowering presence of league and our need to combat that.
So it seemed a little, dunno, ironic that on that huge screen were some replays of league games.
Just kinda struck me dumb somehow.
Meh, maybe I should not have said all this, of no real importance in and of itself. just kinda symbolic in some way.
