My favourite rugby league underdogs of all time

I've replied to this but it must've been moder8ed, Could it be my use of the word that describes the phrase slow winger? It was Oxy(gen) Maroon.

The Sharks 1989 play-off for 5th was their finest hour, until 2016. Plenty of stars, but many people wrote them off beforehand.

I remember Tutty being out but I wasn't aware of the others missing. Leo Nosworthy was a 2nd cousin of my mother a St-George fan of the 30s. I worked at ANU with Johhny Hawke's son who told me the Australian selectors promised Hawke he would be be the Australian captain for the tests against England but they were over ruled by Souths who put the young Clive Churchill in charge. According to Bob Bugden Churchill helped St-George win in 1956 as he thought Balmain half Brian Staunton was still feeling the effects of being knocked out by a Clive Churchill high tackle. It's funny how some players could get away with it.

Yes I lived in Hurstville a short walk through Rockdale and across Carlton station into Kogarah where I queued for a good seat in the Jubilee Oval grandstand. I don't agree that adding illawarra changes nothing but they were on the Illawarra line and could get players to get on a train to attend training at Kogarah.

I was looking for some reason to explain why he was so slow. A slow winger is an oxymoron but maybe they had salary cap constraints that forced them to choose a position to ignore. It's hard to understand.

Tired winger? It was 13 minutes into the second half after a halftime break of 15-20 minutes.

Just a couple of corrections. Beetson was suspended for 2 matches following the Major semi loss 13-14 against Souths. According to Clive Churchill's son, his father came up with tactics to take Beetson out of the game. Those tactics involved each Souths forward skirmishing with Beetson so he would get repetitive warnings ending up in a send-off. He also said Nosworthy and Bolton's tactics in the GF were a brilliant payback. As far as Souths being unbackable favourites, that was with reporters and Souths fans. The Balmain camp was quietly confident. They beat Souths in the first round, led the Major semi most of the match with a man down the entire second half and the result only swinging when a late dubious penalty was awarded. Balmain were also without a number of first grade players for the whole year because of sitting out the year or injury including Dennis Tutty, Laurie Moraschi. Peter Jones, Olaf Pratl and Hal Browne

You do realize why they are called Saints don't you? As in St George? Adding illawarra changes nothing.

He had a great battle with Steve Morris that year. He caught and tackled Morris in the grand final and there weren't many that could do that. Steve Morris was quick and was especially destructive against Souths.

I've had that happen on a few occasions. When discussing the final series of 1955 it was known as Souths fairy tale run due to their long run of must win games. St-George lost the preliminary final to Souths with a 14-2 2nd half penalty count in Souths favour. Ken Kearney the St-George captain coach (53-55 & 57-62) and hooker asked what one penalty was for and Col Pearce said "to show you who is boss". Recently Alan Clarkson talked of him and Col Pearce as Souths fans and going to watch and cheer for Souths together. This is history and we should be free to discuss it.

Given the previous results between the two it was the Storm who were underdogs and their 2nd half was one hell of a comeback. I have a soft spot for Balmain and was very disappointed in 89 but my son was crying and had to go to school and endure all the Raiders fans celebrations. He loves to see the Raiders lose and was happy last year.

And that was as the St-George-Illawarra Dragons. Our step up to the national rugby league competition as the Illawarra line leaving from platform 23 of central station. Saints are thing of the past.

For me it was the Canterbury Entertainers in 1979 coming from the clouds to beat the much more fancied Sharks and Eels in the finals before coming up agonizingly short in the grand final against St George. Young, fresh, fast and exciting, none more so than Steve Mortimer. He was probably a better player later in but he was never more exciting than in 79. Electric pace, tries from the scrum base, chip and chase. Just brilliant.

Chris Close once got spun around and took off in the wrong direction with the ball, running towards his own try line.

The funniest thing? I thought when Meninga smashed Lamb in a legal tackle sending him to Disneyland was the funniest, especially after what Lamb did to Hanley in 88.

My brother in law is an Eels fan. I watched the 2001 GF with him. Parra broke all sorts of records that year and were streets ahead of every other team I’ve never seen a man broken like that. He went from very confident, without being cocky to completely despondent in 40 minutes At the tail end of the 01 season, Parra were so far in front that Brian Smith started tinkering with the side to prepare for every eventuality. He played Brad Drew at 7 and gave Vaeliki time at fullback as well as a few other changes. It’s my brother in laws theory that it interrupted their momentum and got them uptight The Dogs were unlucky not to be minor premiers in 09. We got a crook decision against the Dragons that cost us the minor premiership in the last or second last round. We were a very good team. But the Eels blew us off the park. The first half was close on the scoreboard but the Eels did so much offloading and second phase play that the Dogs were exhausted by half time. Every play the Dogs defensive line would come up, then back pedal as the tackle was made, but then have to come up again as Cayless or Hindmarsh or Moi Moi popped an unlikely offload. So they effectively did twice as much work in D as they normally would They weren’t all great passes but the Eels had Hayne, Mortimer and Robson sniffing around the ruck waiting for half chances Dogs got a bit of ball at the start of the second half but I’ve never seen a side so flat after half a game. I knew we were gone. Scoreboard probably doesn’t tell the true story of the game

It's a euphemism and I'm sure I've seen funnier things even on a football field. The funniest thing was in a Saints v Manly game at the SCG in the late 60s. I was in the Noble/Bradman stand directly behind the posts. Saints won a scrum in their own half, the ball went to 5/8 Tony Branson who dummied and stepped through the Manly defence. The Manly scrum was slow to break leaving Branson racing towards the fullback Mark Willoughby who was standing on the quarter line centre field waiting. As Branson neared Willoughby with no one else in the vicinity he threw a dummy to no one but Willoughby fell for it and ran towards the invisible support player.

It would be great to be able to access that info Having finished 6th and with the Super League drama they must have been a decent price. On the other side they’d finished first in 93, 94. While they had an up and down year, they were never out of the eight...they just never looked that convincing They won their first three games but then had a bad run mid season - no doubt when the SL drama kicked off. They came into the semis having won three straight. Their last or second last game of the season was a 60 point towelling of the rookie Cowboys - but even with that they had by far the worst for and against of the finalists. More than 300 behind Manly Manly, Raiders and Broncos finished 1, 2 and 3. Manly and the Raiders only lost two games each all season and the Broncos had their star studded side with players like Langer, Walters, Walters, Lazarus, Renouf, etc. Those three would have been very short and then probably a decent gap in the market At a guess I’d say the Dogs must have been around $15-$20 at the start of the finals...???

Yes Souths had 9 players in a game on the 1970 Kangaroo tour and were favourites but I wasn’t surprised to see them get beaten in the grand final. Souths were minor premiers on 36 points and Balmain were 2nd on 34 points well clear of Saints and Manly on 28 points. Souths won the major semi 14-13 but Balmain showed with a little improvement they were a good chance. Souths were unable to score a try and never looked like winning the grand final. I was too young to bet.

The funniest thing? What a fun life you have enjoyed. Although dragons fans have only enjoyed 1 premiership in the last 40 years.