State of Origin

[red750]

A couple of things I can't fathom, maybe you can sort me out.

 

Firstly - Union. The Lineout (is that what it's called?) where they hoist a guy shoulder high to catch a ball thrown in. What's that all about? Can't they jump?

 

Then there's scrums. According to Victorians, they are lines of guys with their heads up the next line's butts. If they are meant to sort out a lockup in play and restart on an equal basis, then they are a failure. As the ball is fed by a team member, he feeds it towards his team giving them an advantage, not into the middle of the scrum.

 

In AFL, as in basketball, such things are decided by an umpire throwing the ball in the air and both teams having equal opportunity to win the ball. They used to bounce the ball, but it often flew one way or the other , disadvantaging one team. The centre bounce is now reserved for starting a quarter or recommencing after a goal.If the ball goes over the boundary and becomes a dead ball, a boundary umpire turns his back on the game and throws the ball over his head where the rucks jump for it.

[old man emu]

At least rugby scrums are set pieces so that both hookers can strike at the ball. League scrums now are simply a way of keeping the slow forwards out of the way of the fast running backs. Once, long ago, the ball had to be fed into the tunnel in the centre of the scrum. Putting it in behind the legs of the front rowers was a penalty. Now the ball goes straight into the second row, with the lock standing virtually out of the scrum. When was the last time you saw the forwards of one team push the other side off the ball?  I saw it some years ago and the opposition team was stunned.

 

However, rugby league now simply consists of five runs then a kick. Gone are the glory days of the ball being passed back and forth across the field, ending with a fleet-footed winger side-stepping a desperate full-back to put the ball down over the try line. Are "don't argues" still allowed?

[willedoo]

Scrums are always up for debate; there's always people calling for them to be deleted from the game. In League it seems to temporarily slow the game but has taken on the job of a penalty to one side. Maybe it has just become another penalty form and they keep the scrum for sentiment because it's a traditional part of the game.

 

On the Union side, their scrums are like they were in League years ago where it was used as a decider. If League had kept that form of scrum, there wouldn't be any paying spectators left by now. I remember as a kid at school, the league scrums were a mess. Two packs pushing each other around the paddock all day. Scrums collapsing and the ref making everyone start all over again. It made it a slow and cumbersome game. Some League rule changes have been good for safety, but most have been to speed the game up and keep it entertaining.

 

As far as the lineouts, I played Union for a couple of months as a kid and still can't remember what that was all about. I'll have to google lineouts.

 

In the last 40 years we've had a large influx of Victorians into S.E. Queensland and they brought their footy code with them. We used to chuck off at them about aerial ping pong, but some of their responses were amusing. A lot of Victorians used to refer to our rugby league as playing 'kissy bums' or 'catch me, f**k me'

[red750]

Don't Argues are still around. Richmond's Dustin Martin is one of the leading exponents. Three time Premiership player, Brownlow Medalist, and a Kiwi.

 

[red750]

Not State of Origin, but I see the Wobblies won game 2 4 of the Bloody Slow Cup.