Mark Latham puts the boot into rugby union

Well said.

Martin - unfortunately in Spiro's paraphrasing of what I wrote he used "in the last season of unlimited tackles" instead of "in the last seasonS of unlimited tackles". You will see Spiro went on to quote figures I referred to from 1965 and 1966 as being the last seasons of unlimited tackle RL. My original story is here: http://tribe13.wordpress.com/2010/09/19/unlimited-tackle-rugby/ It is also a myth that St George failed to adapt to limited tackle RL in 1967. They were minor premiers in 1967, and were leading the Final against Canterbury 9-0 before being run down 12-11. That's how close they came to making their 12th Grand Final in a row. St George's demise had more to do with aging players, the loss of Kevin Ryan (who was the key to that Canterbury team) and the loss of a large chunk of the club's junior base via the formation of the Cronulla Sharks.

Mark Latham has been vilified by nearly everyone however he added some colour and excitement to our boring almost useless federal parliament. This added to the earlier loss of the colourful Paul Keating was a big loss. Latham's comments on rugby league are close to the mark. However I have to query the expert Fagan's comments saying 1966 was the start of the four tackle rule. I think you will find it was 1967 and St George did not play in the grand final that year which ended an eleven year winning record. They did not fully adapt to the limited tackle rule and this cost them dearly.

Well, any resurgence in playing numbers is going to lead to interest in crowd support at the top level and club membership etc. The rise of the NSWRU and reformation of the QRU are not the result of one individual action/event by/against RL/RU (for example, the Waratahs tour of Britain was also extremely influential in terms of reinvigorating the code in both states). In terms of RL changing the play-the-ball in 1926, it wasn't an instant move of social footballers from RL to RU, but gradual. Moreover, few footballers nor the NSWRL/QRL (apart from the Harry Sunderland types) saw RU as another sport - it was all just "rugby" with one pro and one amateur - the majority of social footballers in the early 1920s were playing RL because it was a better game to play at that time - in 1926 that changed in favour of RU in Sydney, and led to renewed interest in reforming the QRU two years later. The NSWRL were always mindful of rival rugby bodies being formed, as they potentially could usurp the NSWRL by signing players/clubs etc. Tney killed off a women's RL in 1923 once the women handed control over to Mick Simmons, out of fear it would turn into a rival RL for men's teams (and it easily could have). But they never saw RU as a potential rival - they argued if RU allowed professionalism, then the RL would have been vindicated, and I imagine that believed "rugby" in Aust would all again be one happy family (and one controlling body), By the time that came to reality in 1995, both were seen as different sports with 9 decades of separate history and culture. We can see in hindsight that the NSWRL made mistakes in the 1920s that it is paying for now - the NSWRL could easily have killed off RU in Sydney in the early 1920s by fully embracing the social footballer and schools, and though it did to an extent try (the GPS schools annually had close votes rejecting RL), they weren't hell-bent on destroying RU...after all, few officials in the 1920s were young enough to have been born and bred solely on RL...they didn't hate RU.

Would the introduction of the new play the ball rules, rule changes and and other factors also contributed to the rise of NSWRU in 1926? Im assuming that the majority loved the game they know and they were playing and didn't like the changes that were made. More like a stand as they see this new rules as also like having a new game has just been introduce to them. I know rugby and league players and fans would not want to see some billionaire come in and say ok lets get rid of scrums, lineouts, play the ball. kicking and have bads and helmets and tryies will now be call touch down.

Westy - re "By the end of the 1930.s the fledgling “amatuer” rugby league clubs had taken over 70% of amateur district rugby players in NSW and QLD" - I haven't looked closely at that issue, but from what I can see the greatest period of RL dominance was in the early 1920s, and the rise of RU really began in 1926 when RL introduced the modern 4-man play-the-ball, which sped up the game to the point where social RU was a better option (training, fitness, risk of injury) for most than social RL. It's another reason RL never spread far - like American football, RL increasingly was simply not a social/part-time footballer's game, especially compared to RU, soccer and Aust rules. The 4-tackle and then 6-tackle rule dramatically again sped up the game and the fitness demands - it triggered the rapid rise of touch footy in NSW/QLD from the late 1960s onwards.

westy - took me a while find PG's comment... "I remember reading somewhere that Union was tolerant of League in its early stages — letting them use their grounds and soforth because they feared the threat of VFL at the time and thought league would get the working man interested in Rugby I would think that at this holds true at this point in time as well as then. League has a lot more in common with Rugby then it has against it." I think what PG was recalling was observations I'd made in articles such as http://www.RL1908.com/articles/aust-rules.htm Westy is right to point out that Sydney's working class weren't idly sitting by in the early 1900s - they were very much the larger part of the RU players in Sydney, and they were agitating for reforms in terms of financial allowances and medical expenses. The NSWRU refused to answer their demands, citing its affiliation to the RFU and the rules against professionalism (ie paying players). The fear amonst some in RU (but not neccesarily the NSWRU officials) was that if Aust rules (or even soccer) made headway in Sydney, these codes would have no qualms about addressing the financial needs for working class players. There is no doubt that a great many in RU hoped that the formation of the NSWRL would lead to the NSWRU cutting its link to the RFU and allowing professionalism (and the NSWRL & NSWRU then becoming one body), or the NSWRU disappearing and all rugby players simply moving across to the NSWRL - both scenarios are really the same thing. In short, the view taken was it was better to have RL and a badly depleted RU, rather than see RU lose the working class men to Aust rules or even soccer, which ultimately would have lead to RU's demise anyway... The existence of professional RL sheltered amateur RU away from Aust rules. If RL had not come into existence in NSW/QLD, I'm in no doubt that RU would not have survived at all against Aust rules, as it would have met the needs of the working class...and while RU could always sit side by side with RL (given one was pro, one was amatuer), RU would not have been so fortunate against the sheer scale of a fully national Aust rules game.

PG i want to read where you read rugby was quite tolerant of rugby league in the early days.. As Spiro says Sean Fagan knows much about the early history of the split and he would be very amused to read how tolerant rugby was of league. My God never let facts get in the way.The NSWRU adopted hook line and sinker the ERU edict for a nasty vitriolic and highly personal attack on those early rugby league players and banned them from ever playing rugby again and made serious attempts to prevent rugby league clubs using established city grounds. The matter could have been resolved in Australia. It was the failure of the NSWRU to adopt an independent approach like NZ rather than the class combative approch of the ERU that failed to resolve the problem. When will we ever understand that the working classes in NSW and QLD already played rugby union before 1908.. The introduction of the Metropolitan rugby competition saw the rise of Glebe a very working class rugby club as the most successful club winning 5 of 8 premierships before the split. The Balmaniacs out at Birchgrove had already made it uncomfortable for more genteel visitors. Australian Rugby forgot the fundamentally egalitarian nature of the then Australian sporting landscape. The then NSWRU secretary was full time employee on a very handsome salary . Their inaction cost Australian rugby dearly. By the end of the 1930.s the fledgling "amatuer" rugby league clubs had taken over 70% of amateur district rugby players in NSW and QLD whilst rugby retreated into elitist mumbo jumbo long long before a pokie machine was ever seen . It is Australian rugby union that has again embraced those who were always part of its playing landscape,

I'm annoyed to see Latham write this about my favourite sport! Obviously he hasn't watched any games this year. Whilst I don't agree with his aggro ultra-masculine retrogressive attitudes towards women, I think his take on the state of politics in Australia (well at least that of Labor and Liberal) is completely accurate. In regards to the line that "Union is boring" - jeez I'm sick of that, leaguies just repeat it all the time (along with the 'supurb athletes' chestnut)! Union was boring last year, but it goes up and down and right now it is great! The comparison with mid-60s league is very interesting...Ill have to read up on that... Ive mentioned before that rugby writers did the game a great disservice last year by telling us all how boring union was. Thanks for providing ammuniton to the masses...!

the main problem with the RWC's have been the northern hemisphere admins and fans, who like it no matter what. I think this RWC will bring back rugby into households a bit more, and hopefully build more.

In one word: Absolutely. Try to find a city in the western world that has changed its allegiance from a professional football code to another professsional code - there aren't any that I can think of. RL was a pro game, and was never going to usurp or rival an existing pro game in any city. All its income primarily went towards funding the pro game, not on expansion as an amateur game, especially when RU ably filled that void. Also worth remembering that until the 1960s no one saw RL and RU as different sports, merely the same sport played pro or amateur - so why would a RL body set up a schem to replicate what RU was already providing for free? In hindsight that looks a flawed plan by RL, but they figured if RU ever went pro, well, the "war" would be over, and those who pioneered pro rugby would have been vindicated. They never envisaged a day where there would be two rival pro rugby games - had they feared that possibility, they would have taken over amateur "rugby" in Aust. To illustrate the point....While the post WW1 revival of RU in NSW and then later QLD - from a lowpoint of just a handful of GPS schools and clubs in Sydney, while all of NSW/QLD was RL amatuer/pro - is the reflection of solid effort and perserverance, its resurgence was aided by RL's decision in 1926 to change the play-the-ball rule (to the 4 man form we all know today) - the upshot of that rule change was it almost overnight killed off the social levels of RL, and almost all of those players/teams took to RU as it was less demanding for training and playing. But the NSWRL weren't concerned, as it they were content for the NSWRU to handle the amateur side of rugby. RL has spread much further in the past 15 years than ever in its history - that coincides with RU turning pro and that level of the game driving rule changes...the gap in fitness/training required to play both codes is closing.

Would you said then that rugby been amateur is the main reason the game grew in many places than rugby league? That it was a game for the people not the game for a few clubs like it was for league in England and Australia? I've notice this in touch rugby when in the 80's and 90's touch rugby was played by millions of Kiwi's in the summer. Families and people of all ages, sizes and nationality played the game for fun at an amateur level. Late 90's touch rugby started to get serious and most of the amateur players were pushed out of the way into the number 8 field so the faster and fit players can play in the main ground. It is now played by hundred of thousands and the fun taken out of it and most families don't go as it use to before.

Thanks AC. What I was arguing was that the more reasoned rugby minds of the late 19th century understood that the game (on the field) would not function as well if men were dependent upon playing the game to earn all/part of their livelihood - they argued, and I tend to agree with them, that the rules of rugby (unlike cricket where the ball and every act is always visible) put a significant reliance upon the men playing rugby to play within the spirit of the game, not to resort to cheating in scrums/rucks (where the ref/crowd couldn't see), and to admit to an error when made. [See this story I wrote re Richie McCaw and the debate about his tactics: http://jottingsonrugby.com/2010/08/13/all-blacks/ ] I'm not suggesting we return to amateur era thinking, but a point will come where the rule books of both rugby codes require a complete re-write to reflect the mindset of the professional player and coach. We're still using an amended form of laws written deep in Victorian England's amateur rugby. RL is already at that point (though few acknowledge it), and RU will ultimately get there as well. American football began with the rugby law book too, but you wouldn't know that by reading the NFL rules now.

The thing about Latham is that he still bitter about missing out on becoming PM in 2004. He's simply a bitter old man, who is just simply determined to create controversy for himself. In fact he craves controversy, and the media attention. We saw it during the election campaign, and we are seeing it now. The simple fact is he needs to grow up.

How 'definitive' Jus. The argument will be decided out in the stands and in front of TV screens anyway regardless. Hopefully Rugby can put on a good show at the next WC to back up all the bluster. The successive WC's seem to have been getting more and more hyped but less and less entertaining (interesting?) not more so. But this may be the occasion it turns around.

May be time for the definitive argument. What is "better"? Rugby or League or Soccer. For me its Rugby. Its more Interesting.

The leaguies on this post are such a joke! The problem with leaguies is that they are all hypocrites. They say RWC is not big, when their own 'World Cup' is a farce which loses money and is only shown live on TV in 2 countries - you guessed it, NZ and Australia, They say Union is not popular globally, but Union was just voted into the elite Olympic sports by a huge majority of IOC members from all over the world exactly for the reason that it IS popular globally and growing at a MASSIVE rate!! Why else would the IOC admit Union? But no, leaguies again conveniently ignore the FACTS, and make up their own ones instead. They say League is tougher than union, but I;ve never seen a league player with cauliflowered ears or with a nose like Stephen Moore's. Most league players are pretty boys who can't handle the vigours of a real contact sport like Union. Their 'giants' like Willie Mason are the size of little school boys compared to Union forwards. I can understand a football fan having a go at Union, but a League supporter?? Come on. Pure hypocrasy, with a touch of small man's disease I think.

T.I.C. anyone? This debate is so intellectually shallow that I would like to change the subject to one of greater sociological impact. Who is greater, a fan of Lady Gaga, or a fan of Princess Dianna? Please, everyone, get a life!

You cannot seriously be saying that the current interpretations are worse than those in use during the 2007 RWC. You can still contest the ruck and the clean steal can still occur - it just doesn't happen every second breakdown! Have a look at the ITM cup if you think rucks can no longer be contested.

Off topic -- but there was an interesting interview with Sean Fagan on the ABC about his pass-time. Sean is league through-and-through but through his research I think he's come to realise that there was merit in the RU authorities keeping the game amateur from the stance of purely keeping the game for the players. There was/is of course a lot of other social BS along the way but framing it purely in terms of class is far too simplistic.