Here’s one for you, sports fans: has the NRL ever been better to watch than right now?
The question is being asked more frequently after a cracking start to the season that has featured close matches, thrilling matches and absolutely batshit-crazy matches, such as the Bulldogs-Roosters fixture last Friday.
Melbourne’s win over the Broncos to start the last round featured some of the best tries in memory – in the first half from both sides.
Teams such as Canberra, the Warriors, even my beloved Dragons on occasion, are playing the brand of football that makes you stop scrolling on your phone and take notice.
Wingers, who for generations have earned the disdain of coaches for never doing enough work, are the new kings of the game. They’ve become just as important as the fullback and will soon enough demand the same money.
When they aren’t gobbling up invaluable metres on kick returns or tackles early in the set, they’re contorting themselves like Cirque du Soleil acrobats in midair so they can plant the ball in the corner.
At training, teams put gymnastic pads around the corner post and wingers practice leaping into the stratosphere with the ball in both hands then shifting it into the left or right before putting it down.
Tries like this from Storm winger Xavier Coates have rugby league humming.Credit: Getty
Fabulous frikkin’ stuff.
I even love the ever-changing terminology being used in rugby league. Who’d have thought we’d be talking about “cynical disruptors” (attacking players running through on kicks to disrupt the player catching it) running wild in your “drop zone” (the area where the ball is about to land)?
(For the record, if I ever become a hip-hop artist or a Mexican wrestler, I’ll be calling myself “The Cynical Disruptor” thank you very much).
In my lifetime, there have been two golden periods for rugby league: the early 1990s when teams weren’t afraid to use the ball and didn’t rely on endless decoy/lead runners to confound the defence, and the early 2000s, before wrestling tactics destroyed the world.
The NRL is faster and more exciting than ever.Credit: Getty
But this season thus far is right up there, and it extends beyond the so-called halo effect of starting the season with a double-header in a little desert town called Las Vegas.
The NRL gave itself a well-deserved pat on the back at the weekend when it released some favourable numbers across its social media platforms.
For the season so far, it says, there have been on average more play-the-balls, quicker play-the-balls, more line-breaks and fewer three-man tackles. As a result, crowds are booming.
The NRL argues that a quicker game, because of the six-to-go rule introduced in 2020, is responsible for a better spectacle because it’s created more fatigue.
But fans – and a few coaches to whom I chatted – are asking if it’s come at a price. Some clubs this season have injury lists so long they go out the door and around the corner, mostly from concussion or soft tissue injuries such as hamstrings.
Broncos fullback Reece Walsh has joined the long list of injured players.Credit: Getty Images
Consider the carnage just in round three: Alex Twal (concussion); Taine Tuaupiki (concussion), Nathan Cleary (hamstring); Scott Sorensen (MCL sprain); Lindsay Collins (hamstring); Sandon Smith (elbow); Sam Walker (neck); Reece Walsh (eye socket); Tino Fa’asuamaleaui (ACL); Dale Finucane (eye socket); Toby Rudolf (syndesmosis); Royce Hunt (calf strain); Mitch Moses (foot); Bryce Cartwright (ribs); Reimis Smith (ribs).
Some clubs, like the Bulldogs, have been so ravaged they’ve been dipping into their second-tier salary cap since round one. They lost no fewer than seven players last weekend and head into Friday night’s match against the Storm seriously undermanned. Souths and the Warriors have also been decimated by injuries.
But don’t be so quick to judge the new rules, says Graham Annesley, the NRL head of elite competitions.
NRL head of football Graham Annesley says the injury rate is down.Credit: NRL Photos
He reveals the number of injuries has decreased since 2020, down from 15.4 per round that season to 10.7 per round so far this year.
It’s also difficult to judge how many collision or soft tissue injuries can be attributed to a faster game.
“While the quality of play has never been better, there are less games missed due to injury now than at any time over the last five years,” Annesley said.
Push to get Richo back to Souths
While the chess pieces are being moved in the background to bring Wayne Bennett back to South Sydney, powerful figures at the club also want Wests Tigers interim chief executive Shane Richardson to make a stunning return.
The veteran administrator was spotted lunching with Rabbitohs officials on Wednesday, although I’ve been assured the catch-up was scheduled long before the axe was being sharpened to sack coach Jason Demetriou.
Nevertheless, the push to bring back Richardson as head of football – a role he previously held until he left in 2020 – to support Bennett is well and truly on.
Whether it happens depends, largely, on the Tigers.
Wests Tigers CEO Shane Richardson has been spotted lunching with Rabbitohs officials.Credit: Dean Sewell
Richardson is contracted on an interim basis until June 30 and has been negotiating a three-year extension for more than a month.
But he’s told the club if the governance reform initiated by the Holman-Barnes Group – the Western Suburbs side of the joint-venture – isn’t completed then he’ll be out the door.
Part of that reform led to Richardson being installed in the first place, but the recommendation from former NRL chief financial officer Tony Crawford and businessman Gary Barnier for three independents to sit on the board alongside chairman Barry O’Farrell has not yet happened.
While Richardson has the Tigers pointed in the right direction, he wants to know who he’s answerable to before agreeing to stay.
Souths are keeping an eye on the situation as they work out what to do if Demetriou doesn’t survive.
Richardson mightn’t be on the Christmas card list of chairman Nick Pappas, but he has a critical ally in co-owner Russell Crowe.
Russell Crowe is a key ally of Shane Richardson.Credit: Getty
The Hollywood actor has a deep affection for Bennett, but with Richardson it’s more of an abiding respect because of his ability to make hard decisions and not care whose feelings might get bruised.
He was responsible for bringing Bennett to the club in late 2018 after flying to the UK where Bennett was coaching England following a tumultuous and ultimately final season at the Broncos.
The pair butted heads early on over the signing of Latrell Mitchell, but eventually developed a close relationship because Bennett could focus on the NRL team while Richardson worried about recruitment, retention and pathways.
Wayne Bennett and Shane Richardson clashed over the recruitment of Latrell Mitchell.Credit: Getty
Speculation that they fell out was wide of the mark. Rather, they clashed on footy matters, a healthy and inevitable dynamic at any club.
If Bennett was to return to Souths, it’s hard to see it happening without Richardson supporting him.
Doubtless, your poor old correspondent will be accused of doing Richardson’s bidding because, well, this is rugby league and people are idiots.
He refused to comment when approached on Thursday and was unhappy the piece was being written. O’Farrell also refused to comment.
Lesson from rugby on trolls
A Brisbane troll called Aaron Isaia — who is a youth worker in his day job would you believe? — has been fined $1000 and given a 12-month good behaviour bond for sending “vile and toxic” online abuse in a drunken rage to a Rugby World Cup match official and his family.
The abuse was picked up by a company monitoring referees’ social media accounts during the tournament.
Every code should be using this type of service all season, every season to make sure match officials are protected from endless hate.
In 2018, leading NRL referee Matt Cecchin revealed in these pages he was walking away because of the abuse.
The previous year, the online hate directed at him after the World Cup semi-final between Tonga and England was so fierce it raised red flags with federal police in both Australia and New Zealand.
Things were going to change after that, apparently. We were all going to breathe and step back and get some perspective.
Then you read some of the filthy abuse directed at referee Todd Smith and the Bunker after their controversial decision to award a try after Manly winger Tommy Talau appeared to knock the ball on against Penrith, and you despair about humanity.
Nine experts Andrew Johns, Billy Slater and Brad Fittler agreed with Smith.
They were probably trolled, too. Can you all stop trolling? Thanks.
THE QUOTE
“That’s it. She can have it.” – American private equity tycoon John Stewart down the phone line to Inglis boss Mark Webster when he learned Debbie Kepitis had bid $10 million to buy the Winx foal of which she already owned a third.
THUMBS UP
Three weeks after losing the great Ian Heads, another giant of rugby league has passed away in Keith Barnes, the former Balmain, NSW and Kangaroos fullback who could toe-poke goals from inside his own half. A shrewd administrator with his beloved Tigers, he died this week aged 89.
THUMBS DOWN
A Melbourne Rebels fan faces a possible life ban after he allegedly directed racial abuse at Fijian star Frank Lomani at AAMI Park last Friday night. As Drua coach Mick Byrne has suggested – although not in these exact words – if you want to be a racist, stay at home and dribble to your pathetic self.
It’s a big weekend for … Mitchell Pearce. The retired halfback completed Ramadan on Wednesday, so lock up your yum chas and all-you-can-eat buffets.
It’s an even bigger weekend for … the Australian contingent at the US Masters, which includes Cameron Davis, Jason Day, Min Woo Lee, Adam Scott, Cameron Smith and amateur Jasper Stubbs. All eyes, of course, on the balding, slow-moving former superstar who still packs the galleries because, well, he’s Tiger Woods.
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