The NRL’s Heritage Round is a chance for rugby league to look back warmly on the past while celebrating its future… for those who can be arsed making the effort, anyway.
Unfortunately for the code and the wonderful Men of League organisation, which lend their name to the round, many clubs approach the fixtures like your perpetually unorganised mate does any sort of gathering.
You know the bloke. Never has any cash for the birthday card. Turns up to a dinner party with two packets of Samboy chips from the servo around the corner. Wear’s his sister’s calisthenics top and an old footy sock with holes cut in it over his face and tells people he’s Spiderman at your Halloween parties.
Sure, not all Heritage round match-ups are created equal. While everybody loves Souths v Dragons reliving the 1965 grand final, the Storm v Titans battle of the torrid Steve Turner contract tussle doesn’t have quite the same historical punch.
Nevertheless, it’s high time we named and shamed the teams who fail to get into the spirit of things. Below is a rundown of the weekend matches with a definitive Heritage ranking.
Roosters versus Bulldogs
A great start to heritage week, with both teams putting on a traditional strip, plenty of grit and keeping the score below double figures with not too many pesky tries. Loses points for the flashy new digs though.
Heritage ranking: 4 magic sponges.
Brisbane versus Parramatta
Deciding it might be fun to remind everyone of the worst period in the history of rugby league, the Broncos decided to trot out a 1997-inspired strip. And fittingly, like Super League itself, the jersey wasn’t done right (the original had a maroon back) and ended up looking awful.
Parra got into the whole retro thing by actually winning a game away from home.
Heritage ranking: 2.5 magic sponges.
Cronulla versus Warriors
While the Sharks were resplendent in their traditional get-up (they even somehow got rid of all the sponsors!), obviously the Warriors couldn’t find their heritage jersey among the other 12 they will be wearing at some stage this year.
In an effort to make it up to the public though, the Warriors did put in an insipid away performance and then reportedly sack their coach afterwards, which was a nice nod to the franchise’s past.
Heritage ranking: 2 magic sponges.
Penrith versus Canberra
Oh yeah, how good was this! A muddy field, near-empty stands and two teams in colour combinations that off the footy field would get you a life sentence from the fashion police. All it needed was a Colin Van Der Voort cameo and you’d have perfection!
Heritage ranking: 5 magic sponges!
South Sydney versus St George Illawarra
The flagship game of Heritage Round was bizarrely scheduled for a Saturday night, taking a fair bit of the buzz and ‘match of the round’ nostalgia with it. Still, both clubs can be seen to have done the hard yards off the field for the game, even if the Dragons couldn’t do anything on it.
Heritage ranking: 3.5 magic sponges.
Melbourne versus Gold Coast
No, no, no, no, no.
You could almost hear the old timers shaking their heads as injuries were feigned, tries scored willy-nilly and pathetic penalties blown, as the teams conspired to put on the Justin Bieber of rugby league matches.
The water on the concrete changing-room floor however was the fact Melbourne didn’t wear their heritage strip because they’re saving it for “later in the year”, a decision that ranks up there with the final one of the game in the mind-boggling stakes.
And you’d think it’d be the Gold Coast trying to keep their past in the closet.
Heritage ranking: 1 magic sponge
Wests Tigers versus Manly
At a sodden Leichardt, the Wests Tigers put aside their differences to celebrate the joint venture’s history, and with a full hill, a streaker and a differential penalty, the Tigpies’ walk down memory lane was sensational.
Pity the same cannot be said for the Sea Eagles, who, despite wearing their mid-90s strip, seemed to be paying tribute to the Northern Eagles.
Heritage ranking: Wests 5 magic sponges, Manly ½ a soiled sponge.
Can the NRL fix all this inequity and get all the clubs on the same historical page? Or is heritage round something that should be confined to the history books?
SuperEel22
Roar Guru
Personally I'd like Heritage Round to be planned properly with sides lining up against traditional rivals: Souths Vs Roosters Cowboys Vs Broncos Manly Vs Parramatta Wests Vs Penrith St George Vs Canberra etc.
BrisbaneBhoy
Guest
Not just that, they should also play under the rules of a period gone by and make it truly "heritage" :) As an example, can you imagine today's players running around with the 5m rule and/or only having the 2 replacements on the bench? Priceless :)
Jack
Guest
I feel like it was a pretty good round of footy. I went to 3 games this week, a bit of a footy weekend. Went to Broncos vs Eels at Suncorp, Dragons vs Bunnies at SCG and Tigers vs Sea Eagles at Leichhardt. I reckon Broncos vs Eels gets my vote as being the best game (even though my Broncos lost, it was a cracker of a game with the lead changing all the time). Souths vs Dragons: you could feel the heritage at the SCG, it made me think of all those Grand Finals played there, so that gets my vote as having the most heritage and tradition. Tiges vs Manly in terms of atmosphere was probably the best: it had driving rain, chants from all over the field (I don't think anyone apart from about 10 Manly fans left the game), tinnies on the hill, orange and black everywhere and some good hits and good wet weather footy from the Tigers. All in all a great round to be at the footy.
Shadow
Roar Rookie
There's great potential in heritage round if the clubs embrace it and the NRL schedules appropriate heritage matchups. This week only four games could genuinely be called heritage games. I would have gone with Rabbitohs Roosters Bulldogs Dragons Manly eels (entered 1947) Canberra tigers (Cabrera balmain gfs) Broncos titans Cowboys warriors (entered 1995) Panthers sharks (entered 1967) Storm Newcastle Storm Newcastle being the only non-heritage fixture. Stick with these fixtures season after season and the round becomes an event that fans look forward to. Perhaps even play all games during the day. Heritage round done properly could generate a real positive vibe around league - something we could definitely do with
HARRY HOPWORTHY
Guest
I just can't realistically see Rugby League and Rugby Union merging, and I follow both Rugby codes. The games have been totally separate for over one hundred years. They are of course closely related, brother sports. But they are still different. Just as can be said for American and Canadian Grid-Iron. The similarity would be stronger in those two sports, I'd wager, but I've never heard of any talk about them merging. Also , when two companies merge, it usually means that fifty per cent of the staff would be made jobless, on the veritable scrap heap. Some players are only suited to Rugby League, and others are only suited to Rugby Union. These are the facts. In the future, there might well be the one unified Rugby game. It would certainly make things more simple and less confusing to a number of folk, that's for sure.
70s Mo
Guest
Good one Chris. Actually St George used to play in red and white hoops and changed to the big red V during the war for much the same reasons. Perhaps we could categorise the heritage round further like the WW2 Heritage round, the Great Depression Heritage round (players get half pay) or the fibro/sliver tail heritage round. The convict era? The gold rush? We could relive the Australian history curriculum in heritage rounds!
Chris Chard
Expert
Yeh 70s mo like many teams Souths switched away from the hoops during the war years (think Roosters, Balmain etc) due to difficulty in getting material, the one the Bunnies are sporting this weekend is from that era http://www.rabbitohs.com.au/content/rabbitohs/club/news/2014/04/02/merch_alert_rabbitohs_2014_heritage_jersey.html
HARRY HOPWORTHY
Guest
Also, properly contested scrums.
chris
Guest
I have said it time and time again that Australia can only support one Rugby code and something different has to change for both League and Union and if I was the head of the IRB I would be worried what is going on in the SANZAR countries and try and make the game better again and for Australia I be looking at the NRL and slowly get them merge them back into the Union game.
Bunny Lord
Guest
I fully support this comment.
TGGOA
Guest
So true, hogging the ball when theres a two man overlap, tapping the ball back instead of caching it, penalty-athons, wrestling, shortage of quality halves, football is frustrating to watch these days, compared to the 90's thats for sure.
Menace
Guest
Why have a heritage round - the game today is 6 tackles 4 up the guts, 1 out wide with a runaround then a kick for the corner , the wingers jump and then we go to the video ref to decide if its a try. Perhaps heritage means the same as last week.
Rodney
Roar Pro
typically they used to fall in the first three rounds, but that trend has also reversed (well at least it didn't happen that way last year) Last year the NRL breached 170k for total round attendance on 3 occasions. Round 4, 6 and 26. Round 4 was the easter weekend Round 6 had the Brisbane v N Qld derby but other than that was an ordinary round and of course round 26 was held up by the Marquee Souths v Roosters match. By no means is there no hope for a round to top the 137k mark set by round 2. This year Easter falls on round 6, should have a decent chance of cracking that, weather permitting.
AR
Guest
"AFL ratings in Syd/Bris have plummeted for AFL" This is not really true - since putting all games on 7mate, the ratings have never been that strong in Syd/Bris. But they are very strong for Fox.
Christian D'Aloia
Roar Guru
How was the Bulldogs v Roosters match below average? Both teams got into the grind for the majority of the match, with a single point being the difference between the two teams in the end.
70s Mo
Guest
Is the Souths jersey really a heritage jersey or is it just made up for heritage round? Even in all the old photos they are wearing hoops (except for the strange green one with the red & white band in the Don Lane era). Here are some other suggestions for heritage round: Play some matches at Henson Park and Lidcombe oval. Make the scrums a contest. A mandatory 'softening up' period in the first 10 minutes of every game. See the crowds come flocking back then.
Epiquin
Roar Guru
The AFL and Union have also struggled for crowds this year, and not just in Sydney, so it's not just a "the sky is falling on NRL" thing. Brumbies were grand finalists last year and posted their second lowest attendance ever over the weekend. And yes, the weather was a factor.
Epiquin
Roar Guru
Yeah but if one team has a predominantly pink jersey, while the other team has pink socks or a pink trim to give a nod to the theme I'm sure that would fly.
ElGusto
Guest
Are you kidding me? Raiders wore a jersey with all previous players names on it, specific to the round. What do you expect them to wear, 3/4 sleeves?
Dogs Of War
Roar Guru
THey went to the NHL control centre last year to see how the NHL do the video stuff. I think the NRL should go down that path so you take out the "home crowd" influence. Then you also have the same guys doing the video each game.