Perth Spirit vs Greater Western Sydney Rams: NRC live scores

"The incompetence of the Force" TWAS? Serious, you're an ass.

Yes a good performance. It will be interesting to see whether they can back it up in Fiji next weekend

So what. Whine to someone that cares. NSW has a huge representation in the National team even though they were rubbish as a team in the SR competition. WA players haven't been given the same opportunity. It is the way it is.

Hi TWAS newish to this forum as a Force fan I am devastated by the loss of my team and the rugby vacuum it will create! I've lost my interest in SR. I understand what you are saying when you say players have commitments to wallabies and that injuries do not help. As a Force fan from the start I have seen this happen on a regular basis with players we were looking forward to see play out a season but were robbed cruelly on most occasions by fate- bad luck call it what you will long term injury. Even this year I was looking forward to see chance peni play more games but alas he got injured early. I know the Force isn't the only team to cop the end of the rough end of the injury stick! Melbourne went through this year. All super clubs have been through it at one point or another. The blow of the refs whistle, that doesn't fall your way it all adds to fan frustration. The thing is it is what it is you can't change it! We've been told that consistently while losing our team. Let us rest our hat on something! Please don't deny us even this small pleasure by outlining this SR list we have in the spirit. It is like saying tahs have too many 1st tier players. So what! It is what it is! Unless this iprc comp gets up i'm not sure we in WA will have a lot to cheer about anyway. I can't see us having too many SR players aligned in the years to come to a state that won't have a SR team. I hope it is successful but I feel more pessimistic each day. Sure there maybe avenues for good players in wa to play for a sr side over east and national duties. The fans who are devoted to what the Force was will be left behind though. I'm not sure how they could be recovered how they will be appeased unless there is iprc or a strong NRC team. Fans will soon drift off to other events they can attend where wa have teams AFL, basketball, soccer and cricket. With that the youngsters to will grow to follow different sports and be like those heroes. The sport in perth will not die due to significant diehards of the sport, but what the ARU did was fail rugby in WA as it chased away the new fans to rugby who weren't before. Which could have developed a stronger culture for the sport in wa instead it is now on life support. As these fans feel ARU don't care about us I'll go back to the wafl, the afl etc. these initial fans don't make a difference now. If these fans can be encouraged to continue to support the sport won't their children follow it and from that generation and beyond wouldn't that help to increase the pool and depth of players and fans into the future to make the game great. Whether it was finance or dilution of product it will be important to grow the game. In other sports I have seen teams go for 20, 50 70 years or more without winning a championship. I've seen them even spend decades at or near the bottom and in those time fan support can be tough. We use to get a good crowd in our first few years due to the novelty of a new team. Our crowds dwindled as we did not see the success but gradually unlike some other SR teams. For a team which lacks success in a medium sized city which isn't the number one sport in town the smallest crowd I saw was just under about 8000. I only missed 3 home games. I've been to other games across the east and their crowds are no where near as impressive for all the success they have had. The Melbourne crowd was pathetic in a time where they were showing some glimpses of success. The only crowd I can't personally comment on is Canberra but by tv viewing crowds are based on weather rather than success. I guess with pessimism around in WA about their team and fear of growth in rugby being stunted in this state. Do you see any silver lining or has rugby for fans and players alike hit rugby oblivio? It's just people come up with ideas and you which is your prerogative to do of course shoot them down and to be fair at least you try to defend your stance even though I don't agree with it at times. How do you fix this situation for WA in your opinion? Any positive thoughts?

There is a wide gap - that was your specific complaint. But that is my point exactly - it showed the improvement that would be possible with opportunity and what might be possible if a team like the Rams were training professionally as the Spirit have had the opportunity to do, despite mostly being the players adjudged below SR quality. But I disagree about the NRC replacing SR - that would just be SR with more teams, less money per team, lower standards and Premier rugby gutted and turned into Subbies. And on top the best players would all head north, as they wouldn't be earning remotely near enough to stay. IMO, something like SR is needed to pay the best something competitive. But below that the next generation should be being paid enough to pursue their dream and train professionally, at least long enough to sort out those that really have a genuine shot rather than just those who look good in amateur footie. They can play Premier rugby while doing that and lift that standard in the process, but they then need the NRC to check their progress and teach them some of the harder lessons. Because, if they were all training as professionals right across the competition, it wouldn't look like the Spirit versus the Rams - all the teams would look like the Spirit did in that game but better, with even the amateurs being professionals instead. And if you had eight teams like that from which to select SR players, the way NZ has 14 teams of professionals to choose from, then maybe, just maybe, Aus might finally start clawing back some of the ridiculous gap that has been opened up by the stupid clinging to outdated structures and the delusion that amateurs can step into fully professional rugby or even put selection pressure on professionals. The same players can, but only if they are also and already professionals.

You have missed the whole point of my argument. You're being disingenuous with your assertion that there is a wide gap between the next generation of Waratahs and players "not good enough for Super Rugby". The next generation of Waratahs, or Reds for that matter, are these very Premier Club players who are denied exposure to a higher level of competition because there aren't enough teams at the professional level in NSW and QLD, which have the highest player numbers. In the current Super Rugby setup, there are a limited number of places for aspiring talent, regardless of how good they are. That doesn't mean to say that those further down the pecking order don't necessarily have the potential to perform at a higher level if given the opportunity. In any event, I was working on the premise that there is no Super Rugby and that in its place there was a purely domestic competition over a full season, such as an expanded NRC, where more players, particularly from NSW and QLD because of their greater numbers, were exposed to a full time professional environment with an increased number of teams. It would then be a more level playing field for all participants over a full season. The Premier Club competitions could still run in tandem with the domestic NRC, albeit without their representative NRC players, but is that so different to what happens now with Super Rugby? There will always be plenty of talent in club ranks to fill the void and expose even more aspiring players to a higher level of competition. The season long NRC should conclude prior to the Rugby Championship (please call it something more meaningful to the Southern Hemisphere) as Super Rugby does now, and those NRC players who aren't required for the Wallabies roster would return to their respective Premier Clubs for the remainder of the season. The Premier Club competitions could then be extended in the absence of having to terminate early to fit in with the NRC as it now stands.

No, I think we need the NRC in its current window, full professional for the main team but mostly at entry level money. That means four to five teams worth of junior professionals still playing in Premier Rugby around the country, then joining the SR leftovers for the NRC. If anything, it would produce a comp where all the teams would be a step up from the single city teams now. And maybe it is on the way...there has to be a reason why Papworth/Eastwood has suddenly bought into the whole NRC thing. Doing it in parallel with SR means eight full teams drained out of Premier rugby, higher cost, lower standard and attention split across two comps and club rugby. It would be a way, but for mine too big a step just yet from where we are now.

Brisbane and Sydney have much larger rugby populations, with a proportionate number of NRC sides. The counter argument is that many punters here have claimed that the Chute shield is an elite competition worthy of being compared to the NRC. It doesn't matter which way you skin it, It just isn't. There is one ray of hope though, a number of the teams are fielding their emerging talent for the away games to give them experience. This is great for nurturing depth but the final score suffers.

Bleet Bleet, amazing when things aren't going as per your F----d up idea's. Still making statements without any proof. D-------d

So what are you saying? We need more SR teams? or We need an NRC style, elite level, semi-professional comp that runs throughout the season, giving a large number of pathway players experience and visibility. That stuff writes itself doesn't it!

No, Proof that all of the Spirit players have SR contracts, your original postulation. Clay got a call up the morning of the game due to Peter Grant's dodgey curry the night before, and managed to shut down Wallatah Taquile "O'Niell" Nianavaro to cheers and admiration of the large crowd hydrating on the hill. "The Force is strong in this one" ~ Sir Alec Guiness

Which doesn't change the basic point however, which is that it still shows the wide gap that remains between the next generation of Waratahs and players "not good enough for Super Rugby". How much time and effort will need to be put into those players plucked out of Premier rugby - likely, a number of those Rams players - just to get them up to that level, let alone find out whether they are better prospects for SR? Conversely, what the one city teams give a hint at is what all the teams in a professional NRC might look like. Think selecting all your next SR debutantes from a pool of players with two years of professional rugby under their belts could improve things...you know, the way NZ does? Not taking a 2-3 year punt on a amateur to see what happens, but who is somehow supposedly going to put selection pressure on the professional players already in the team.

damn, hard training or they don't like air travel? A shame which explains why I didn't see J.Holloway in any of the clips. Oh well, such is life.

One thing that most commentators seemed to have overlooked is that the NSW and QLD Super Rugby teams have been split into 3 and 2 NRC teams respectively. The one city NRC teams have an advantage in that they are essentially Super Rugby teams minus their Wallaby representatives, with a sprinkling of local club players. The NSW and QLD NRC teams are for the most part predominantly Premier club players, with their Super Rugby players split between the respective State based teams. This is one of the failings of the current NRC setup, in that there is an unequal distribution of Super Rugby talent across the competition. If the NRC was structured as a competition between the 5 Super Rugby sides, excluding their respective Wallaby representatives, then it wouldn't be an issue. However, it's doubtful if such a competition with so few teams would be viable. It's a big ask to expect teams made up of predominantly local club players to be competitive with single city teams which are essentially professional Super Rugby sides. This was clearly demonstrated in Perth Spirit's demolition of the Greater Sydney Rams. Hopefully it will be a reality check for the Rams to see where they are at and they will learn from that experience and progress in their future games. With the NRC being conducted over such a short period, there is no time for club representatives to adjust to the higher level of competition. If however, in the absence of Super Rugby, the NRC became the second tier domestic competition in Australia played over a full season, then the NSW and QLD NRC teams would become competitive with the single city teams from other States because of their greater exposure to that level of competition.

Blame the victim TWAS? The Force was told no team will be cut by the ARU, then the ARU offered to cut a team without consultation with the Force. From that moment there was only one team that could be cut. This is 100% the ARU incompetence, the culling process was always a farce. He only mistake the Force made was to trust the ARU. That I will also lay at the feet of the AR that they signed and used a support-aliance agreement to terminate the entity they were suppose to support.

Seeing that we're into nitpicking let's keep it going. Peter Grant was a late pull-out and didn't play at all. He was replaced by Clay Uyen pre-game. Clay is a Pindan Premier Grade player. Both Anaru Rangi and Matt Philip were brought in for short term injury coverage in 2016. Rangi came off the bench on 5 occasions for a total of 43 minutes (~9 minutes per game). Philips came off the bench on 3 occasions (after the June break) for a total of 84 minutes. Thanks for the small concession with Richie Arnold. He was unable to play at all in 2015/2016. He played his first game in 2017 and has vindicated the faith that the Force has showed in him. I reckon Crazy Horse is entitled to get excited as it was a fantastic home win for the Spirit. Nearly as good as the very enjoyable 40:11 Force win over the Tahs in the last round of SR2017. In that game the Tahs had 9 Wallabies in the starting XV. This win made it 3 wins to the Force in the last 5 encounters. On each occasion there was a similar disparity in the number of Wallabies in each side. It's interesting that when the Force has had previous bad runs with injuries it's been brushed off as lack of depth and problems with the strength and conditioning program. So glad to have the IPRC on the horizon........so we can move on from the play ground squabbling. Besides - my Dad's a policeman! :-)

I'm not knocking the Spirit for daring to have a strong team. That's not their fault. What I'm commenting on is the carry on from some people on here. You'd think the Spirit had performed like the Rising in 2014 (8-0) or Brisbane City in 2015 (7-0) the way people are behaving. As I alluded to below, for a number of reasons the NSW teams are undermanned this year. That's their problem to deal with though.

Glass Half full. Spirit has a stacked team Glass Half empty Rams team wasn't crewed properlty, Why not? NSW should be full of talent, especially with all those available Chute Shield players that Cheiktah has his eye on. Where are guys like Sam Figg this year? A genuine Fardy style replacement that the Wallabies desperately need but couldn't get an SR contract Perhaps they should "Exit" the Spirit from the comp to free up some talent so that the Rams can perform better. ;)

Yet their were still 20 2017 Super Rugby players in their Round 1 team.

You want me to present proof that the 2017 Super Rugby players had 2017 Super Rugby contracts and were capped?