Jason Robinson

Quote: thepriestman85 "I have to admit that i like both RU an RL and watch both.

My major fear with RL is it’s so parochial in the way it thinks. I understand that people don’t like RU, you can’t have one discussion about it without some one saying why bother RU is $h!te. What these people don’t realise is there are things we can learn and take from it and use it to our advantage. But for some reason most RL folk don’t wanna know or don’t want to stick their head out of the comfort zone and look what else is out there and how It might be beneficial for our game.

RU seem to have no problems in looking at RL and saying I like the way they attack and defend so let’s take there players and appoint them to key positions at the club. RL would never do the same thing imo. Take the rumours regarding Eddie Jones coming to Wigan it had some people up in arms on here cause he was a Union mon! What they didn't see was the level to which he's coached, the things he won and the level of player he's worked with. J

I really hope IL can see the uses and benefits RU can have to our game and just doesn’t dismiss it as some want him 2.

I’d also take Radders and Faz in a 2nd as coaches. I’ve said it before but some will succeed and some will fail but at least we are giving them a chance aren’t we?'"

When I commented earlier about the 'grass being greener', I meant that genuinely.

I honestly feel that, for all sorts of reasons, RL is now the poorer option of the two games when it comes to young athletes considering their future.

My grandson plays for a local amateur RL club, and already, at his tender age, some of the lads - even those who are Wigan fanatics - are talking about playing RU in the future, not just because there are better financial prospects, but because the international dimension, and all the attached star status, have become huge.

RL on the other hand is desperately struggling to break new ground; if anything, it's sinking in on itself. We have next to no international game now (I think the ending of the GB and Aus tours was a disaster), and on the domestic front the only way many of our SL clubs can keep their heads above water (thus far!) is by the implementation of a salary cap that has basically ruled us out when it comes to the world's best players. The SC has even played its part in preventing us develop the next generation of home-grown stars, as we found out during the last World Cup, but that's another argument, and I'm not getting into that now.

You are right to point at all those ex-RL men who are currently involved in RU. I'd argue, though, that there simply aren't enough jobs in RL to make use of all that talent. Sure, we could find places for them, but out of the present SL clubs, how many are really viable? We've only got 14 in the top tier as it is, and, out of those, you've got to put questionmarks against the likes of Salford, Wakefield, Celtic, maybe even Cas and Hull KR. Crikey, you could even argue that Saints and Wigan have yet to assure their futures with all the issues surrounding their respective stadia. I don't think the Fords, Larders, Edwards's of this world would find anything attractive at all in RL now, compared to the opportunities in RU.

I have a terrible fear that RL's lifespan in Britain is limited. We keep going for anything Australian - it's almost as though Australia is our big brother, and as long as the game is flourishing over there, everything will be okay. The trouble is, Australia doesn't really care about the British game. They throw us their rejects and belittle all our attempts to compete with them. The way some of their commentators talk, you think they actually loathe us and would rather we were gone.

You're also right to say that parochialism will be the death of us. We are surely the worst in the world for this sort of thing. Wigan fans thought all was fine and dandy with the game in the early 90s, even though our chalking up regular 60-0 scorelines was killing interest at a domestic level. Now, Saints and and Leeds fans think everything's fine with the game, despite the fact that our talent pool and international presence have drastically shrunk. There's nothing like a bit of superficial domestic success to blind you to the bigger picture.

I only hope that what some people on here are saying is true, namely that RU is also building a house of cards that may soon collapse. Because the way things are at present it seems to me that that's the only way we'll make up any ground on them.