What he is right about is that it represents the best schoolboys in Australia, and not the best schoolboys who are Australian and as such is better than a team of the best Australian Juniors as it has included in the past, Benji Marshall and Keiran Foran.

I stated a fact if you do not want to believe it that is your choice. The England GB Team is the academy team all involved in a full time pro setup, the Australian schoolboys team is taken the Australian schools competition. How many of the GB/England team are not signed with a SL club?

Providing a list of players a few of which excelled in internationals is hardly evidence worth considering. Fact remains one is taken exclusively from SL clubs the other is taken from Schools teams, what happens if a player goes to a school that does not play RL ? GB academy team has done very well against Schoolboy teams over the last 8 years do you not find it strange that has not shown itself in SL let alone in Internationals?

Benji Marshall played for the Australian Schoolboys in the same year he made his debut for Wests, what made you think that playing for Australian Schoolboys discounted you from being affiliated with a pro club?

I’m not sure what point he is trying to make... if he thinks that the list of players I posted above were all playing amateur RL until they were 18 and then signed up to a pro club then he’s clearly delusional

Of course, this is the same poster who has stated “Football and RU suffered greater restrictions than RL has endured” so I’m not sure there is a full grasp of reality

Quote: Thoth "I stated a fact if you do not want to believe it that is your choice. The England GB Team is the academy team all involved in a full time pro setup, the Australian schoolboys team is taken the Australian schools competition. How many of the GB/England team are not signed with a SL club? Providing a list of players a few of which excelled in internationals is hardly evidence worth considering. Fact remains one is taken exclusively from SL clubs the other is taken from Schools teams, what happens if a player goes to a school that does not play RL ? GB academy team has done very well against Schoolboy teams over the last 8 years do you not find it strange that has not shown itself in SL let alone in Internationals?'" Thoth i have a match programme from the last schoolboy tour and the professional clubs that these "schoolboys" were affiliated to were listed. The Aussie development system and UK system are different, but the players are equivalents. In the UK few schools play league so players tend to learn at junior clubs and then sign on to professional sides at 16 and go through the academy system. In Australia schools all play league, and schools are closely linked to their local NRL clubs. The best school kids go from their school direct into the Toyota cup, then NRL. Many of the Australian Schoolboys are already playing under 20 Toyota cup when they are selected. Its also wrong to state Academy players are professional, most are only on part time contracts, with a significant number being only on a pay as you play basis. Similarly these aussie "Schoolboys" are not amateurs just turning out for their local school side. full details of these Aussie schoolboy sides can be seen below www.sportingpulse.com/assoc_page ... &sID=26427

Quote: Thoth "I stated a fact if you do not want to believe it that is your choice. The England GB Team is the academy team all involved in a full time pro setup, the Australian schoolboys team is taken the Australian schools competition. How many of the GB/England team are not signed with a SL club? Providing a list of players a few of which excelled in internationals is hardly evidence worth considering. Fact remains one is taken exclusively from SL clubs the other is taken from Schools teams, what happens if a player goes to a school that does not play RL ? GB academy team has done very well against Schoolboy teams over the last 8 years do you not find it strange that has not shown itself in SL let alone in Internationals?'" Thoth i have a match programme from the last schoolboy tour and the professional clubs that these "schoolboys" were affiliated to were listed. The Aussie development system and UK system are different, but the players are equivalents. In the UK few schools play league so players tend to learn at junior clubs and then sign on to professional sides at 16 and go through the academy system. In Australia schools all play league, and schools are closely linked to their local NRL clubs. The best school kids go from their school direct into the Toyota cup, then NRL. Many of the Australian Schoolboys are already playing under 20 Toyota cup when they are selected. Its also wrong to state Academy players are professional, most are only on part time contracts, with a significant number being only on a pay as you play basis. Similarly these aussie "Schoolboys" are not amateurs just turning out for their local school side. full details of these Aussie schoolboy sides can be seen below www.sportingpulse.com/assoc_page ... &sID=26427

I was chatting with the London development officer and he was telling me he looses good prospect 16 year olds to private Union playing schools (trying to win the Daily Mail cup) who offer educational bursaries or equivalent approx value £20-30000 per year, which Quins RL and/ or even the union sides cant compete with. Lost 2 good prospects this year.

Funny how they still end up having to poach RL players, who often instantly become some of the best at that sport.

In Replublic of Ireland and Northern Ireland football and RU faced greater restrictions for a longer period via the GAA Rule 27 being the obvious example and with a bigger impact than any country where RL received restrictions (the equivalent in the UK would be banning football players from playing rugby league). In Russia it was banned for decades and in the former soviet states playing RU was suppressed given it was associated with the freedom movements there (Nazis in Germany and Italian Fascist regimes had similar attitudes to the communists). Some universities in the US banned RU (this is real bans not imagined ones). France were kicked out of the six nations and there is the belated ban on teams touring South Africa.

In comparison with RL we have Vichy government banning RL for a few years, banning of RU players (a minority sport with a low profile) from playing RL, RL not being an officially supported sport in the armed services (most sports were not), schools not playing RL (not the same thing as a ban), getting negative press articles (all sports get this the only country where this happens a lot is australia and that is due to it's high profile).

The above is factual much of what you post is unsupported emotional opinions, as has recently been shown often when somebody provides you with a perspective the you do not want to believe you throw a tantrum.

As for your first comment, I said nothing of the sort, you clearly have issues separating what is written as to making sense of all that mental flotsam and jetsam drifting though your mind.

That is horrible to hear for all league fans.

Rugby League was also banned by the GAA, it suffered the same restrictions. Some Universities banned RU because the players playing RU couldnt behave themselves and spent too much time drinking and fighting. And the ban on sports teams touring south africa wasnt a ban on RU touring south africa but a boycott by all sports for an horrific, racist, murderous regime the stories of the likes of George Nepia and being one of the only sports to break the gleneagles agreement and the Caveliers debacle is a shame on RU, it is pretty disgusting for you to use it as an example of RU being the victim

Regarding GAA you are deliberately being economical with the truth; rugby league was not under the same restrictions rule 27 makes no direct reference to RL when the rule was introduced RL had not been played in Ireland, when rule 27 was voted out of GAA no Irish club had existed it was not until 18 years later that Dublin Blues was formed. So this clearly is not the same restriction.

Fact remains RU was banned at some US universities.
Your incoherent rant regarding RSA and apartheid along with it's inaccuracies is misplaced at no point did I state RU was a victim I merely stated a fact, you have a problem with that fact and seemed to ignore that my post stated that I felt that a ban should have been in place before. You are clearly twisting facts for your own misplaced purposes. Please do not be so overly disgusted and judgemental, just makes you come across as incredibly self-righteous and terribly English.

No, im not. It is you who is simply relying on a distinction without a difference. Good luck with that.
Because of the actions of RU players. RU was played and was allowed until it descended in to a drunken violent mess. RU isnt banned in the US, it isnt banned in Universities some Universities have chosen not to compete or to allow themselves to be represented by drunken thugs, which is fair enough to be honest. If a college student wants to go play RU somewhere outside of their college they are able to. It takes a special sort of person to think that chosing not to be part of something is the same as banning something.
If thats what you feel the need to hide behind, feel free. People will make up their own minds and Im sure to many your attempts to rely on the apartheid era as an example of RU 'being banned' and 'suffering restrictions' is pretty pathetic to most.

some people seem intent on doing the game down. sometimes, by mis-representing figures (intentionally?)

When these are referred to:

2003-2006 – 8 projects £1.66million
2006-2008 – 17 projects £1.26million
2009-2010 – 10 projects £450k

the report is talking about facilities projects funded by the RFL. the Sport England money received by the RFL CANNOT be spent on capital projects so to suggest just 10% is spent on community projects is wrong.

We need to make it a bit more evidence based to judge of the RFL are doing a "good job" or not. What criteria would we use? For me it would include:

Number of junior players playing RL
Number of amateur clubs playing the game
Financial performance of the RFL in terms of income v expenditure
(including media deals)
Crowds at professional games
Performance of the representative sides
Financial stability of professional clubs (to some degree as clubs bare ultimate responsibility for this)
Media coverage of the game (much harder to measure)


I think if we could get comparative measurements of these factors we could stop basing it in perception and base it on fact.

no most jnrs come through the Harold Mathews then SG Ball (or Q'land equivalent) set ups of NRL clubs and the best are already "contracted" usually from 15/16 onwards.