Quote: dally messenger "most of our imports in the nrl would fit right back in the nrl. riddell just got a contract with the roosters
they dont have to be super stars just part of a good team
in ru well have the money to sign their best backs like quade cooper, or some all blacks
remember we have many star rl players in union like craig wing and sonny bill williams
we have tonnes of juniors, origin form comes and goes in patches
our national under 20s comp is on tv and sometimes gets more viewers than the s15
every year many players graduate from this to the nrl'"
'in ru well have the money to sign their best backs like quade cooper, or some all blacks'
RL will have the money for players where money is not the number one incentive for those players to consider swapping codes. Cooper is a good example - right now he could (if he was not contracted) earn more money in Europe than any NRL club could pay him even if the most optimistic guess at a new TV contract proves accurate. If he comes to league, it's because he wants to play league not because it will make him richer. Where money is the principal issue for the player, NRL will be hard-pressed to go head-to-head with ARU over players the latter wants to keep. It has no chance in those circumstances against Europe, and probably Japan as well.
OTOH, every year good to very good RU schoolboy / age-group players come over to league for the simple reason that the number of pro and semi-pro RL clubs offering contracts utterly dwarfs the Oz RU equivalent. This is RL's big advantage. The advent of the Melbourne Rebels may peg this back a bit given time, but only a bit...