Never ever get in a RL conversation with Maurice Bamford unless you've got two hours to spare. Absolute gem of a man who loves his Rugby League.

I've met quite a few players in my 30years+ as a fan and in recent times the ones that stand out as being the most approachable have been:

Ruben Wiki - Had a good chat with him at the Hungry Jacks at Sydney airport
Stanly Gene - Very humble and a great smile that could warm up Alaska
Roy Asotasi - took time out of pre game at MES last year in Perth to sign autographs and meet fans. Really nice guy.

I have met a few pro's but the one who i remeber bein the most polite was the great Ellery Hanley, a true gent and had a good 30 min chat. i also met Andrew Johns the night he got arrested in london, i was chattin to him in Leicester square he was sober and drug free then.
The funniest sportsperson i met was Razor Ruddock in an irish pub in manchester, he sat with me and my mates, he had just done a sportsmans dinner got a wad of cash for it, then he bought me and my mates a few round of drinks. the guy is a legend!!!!!

Thanks mate, thats good of you to say. I don't use the word 'legend' lightly, but if people want to call me one, well I guess I cant deny it.

I've been telling people this since I first joined the forum last year.

Good to see the message is finally sinking in.

Check out 'Barrys tips for round 2' over on the NRL forum.

I'm actually more knowledgeable than Gus Gould... sure we are BOTH footy legends but I managed 6/8 this week and he only got 3.

Once had a good chat with Olivier Elima and Sam Obst. Jason Demetriou and John Kear are immensely friendly folk too, as you would expect them to be, and Jamie Rooney is a great bloke.

Alan Smith, the old Leeds and GB winger, is a lovely man. Had plenty of interesting stories to tell.

Stanley Gene, a fantastic guy and time for everyone.

And before him, the late, great Clive Sullivan ......who worked as an engineer aswell as playing rugby and often larked cricket with him and pals during our dinner breaks.

Good:
Paul Sculthorpe
Willie Talau looking sheepish in a strip club in Sydney
Laurie Daley
Apollo Perelini - gave me some chips
Stevo - completely different in real life to his TV persona

Bad:
Sean Long
Leon Pryce - all round in a pub in Bradford
Paul Newlove - refused to sign an autograph

Good:
Feka
Tommy Leuluai
Mike McGuire
Jason Robinson
Civoneceva
Lockyer


Not so good:
Slater and Thurston seemed like a couple of d!cks

Couldn't knock the bloke tbh. When my daughter (Now 20) and her mates were 15 they used to get to the KC early in time to greet opposing players off the bus - that year Hull won the cup and played Bradford twice in quick succession. Hape was injured for one of the games (if not both). At the cup game only Fielden signed autographs and Hape talked. The next game Hape was last off the bus made a big thing of talking to the girls as if they were old friends; when he'd only seen them for the first time a fortnight or month earlier. It made their day that he'd gone out of his way to be so friendly.

Most will not agree with me on this but bobbie goulding is a top class guy. He's a very good mate of mine and has been for the last 10yrs. He gets terrible press and does like the odd beer but he will do anything for you.

He's great with the kids and is a top bloke. Like anyone he has made mistakes but he is top lad.

Mark Mclinden top bloke sadly missed at Quins.

After Great Britain's 1990 Wembley win, I took a couple of mates to a boozer near a Hotel I'd stayed in four years earlier and who should be in there, but Graeme Lowe. The former Kiwi coach noticed our rugby shirts, bought the round and chatted to us about the previous days game - top bloke I thought!

I met Dave Furner though Work when he was with Wigan(or at the time it could have been Leeds) and he was a gem of a bloke.

Matt King,chatting to him last week in the Lowry outlet mall, really lovely man

Most of the aussies last year at the four nations ,especially pietro civenoseva?sp... sam thaiday and cooper cronk were fab,nathan hindmarsh gave his medal to a young lad also

+1

He was on the same flight back as me from the France-England game last year and was happy to talk about his team at Leigh, what he thought of the French team (and particularly Seb Martins with him being an ex-Leigh player) and even went out of his way when landing at Liverpool to wish us luck for our game at home to Gateshead later that day (sadly it didn't work as we were terrible and ended up getting tonked )