NRL Round 1 - Knights Vs Cowboys - 1:15pm Sunday 1st March (AEDT) - Allegiant Stadium, Las Vegas
- Thread starter Lefty
- Start date
I'm not a fan of the vegas spectacle
Thieves Like Us
Ben Donaldson
Better get used to it. If PVL has his way (and he usually does) there will be more of this type of stuff in the future. I read over the weekend that they are considering an ‘International Round’ to chase more of the foreign dollar. The Saudis will gladly thrown money at the NRL as they continue their sportswashing activities.
mullenmagic
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
Telegraph reporting Mooney will be coming off the bench. Saifiti, Frizell, Croker starting in the middle.
Grandpa Joe
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
Some of the team lists coming out are laughable, we won't know until kick off who are our 19 are going to be and even then we don't know if Holbrook will play silly buggers and switch people around.
Yeah it really doesn’t feel like we are gaining any traction in the American market. Not really any major hype around it over there. Just people being paid to talk about it.
It was always an excuse to use the numbers (where it would be expected with a larger population) to inflate its popularity to seem better then what it was.
The AFL could do the same thing and crow about how they got 100.000 viewers in its first year when it’s really misleading and meaningless number.
I’m really hoping teams who lose valuable home games like us are properly compensated. Otherwise I’d rather them not go.
Not like we have teams who don’t have good grounds or fill stadiums that can lose home games cough cough
Honestly I usually forget about the first game and have usually caught the second game…this time though…
Nevada paid about 600kusd a year to the nrl and apparently it generates 80mil for the economy. naturally the first deal was so low as it was such an unknown but beyond this initial 5 year plan the nrl will have the runs on the board with the data to back it up to sell it for much more and have US states and beyond bidding against each other for it. its a money making excercise now for the nrl nothing more.
That’s been my hope all offseason
That’s shocking.
HarVeeGee13
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
Don't hate it tbh. Minutes matter more than starting/not starting with middle forwards.
slotmachine
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
He's also been pretty ordinary on pre-season form outside the second half of the Maori game.
Lynchyknight
Darren Albert
Pretty certain it would be so our 2 best props arnt on the field at once, this way the whole game atleast one of Mooney and Saf are on the field
HarVeeGee13
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
Yeah and the Cows bench middles will probably be Lodge & Mikaele. Matching Mooney up against them, who are both sort of slow footed plodders compared to their starters Taumalolo & Hess, who are more physically imposing and/or mobile, doesn't sound so bad to me. He's been destroying reserve graders for years but hasn't done the same to good starters in the NRL. Picking on NRL bench forwards is the next step for him.
Yep this is it. You're better off having 2 of the better middles (Saf, Friz, Mooney) out there as much as possible rather than have all 3 of them together or half the game and then they're all off with Croker, Saulo & whoever on... recipe for getting killed through the middle period of the game.
there is more to it than just money & 'growing the game'.
Why do you think PNG are getting an NRL team & the NRL are somehow playing in the US.
Billy
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
The obvious place for a full international round would be in the UK and France.
It's where we could get the most tourists to travel - still a big destination for Australian and NZ tourists - and where we could help the game most.
We could put on double headers with ESL games and fill big venues with locals and tourists.
It's where we could get the most tourists to travel - still a big destination for Australian and NZ tourists - and where we could help the game most.
We could put on double headers with ESL games and fill big venues with locals and tourists.
Grandpa Joe
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
Psaulo seems to have fallen off a cliff.
Absolutely, hopefully goes some way to solving our huge problem last year. Competitive for the first 20, then fall apart for the middle 40 minutes as our bench forwards come into play.
Joshhh
Danny 'Bedsy' Buderus
PVL is a super polarizing figure because people don't like change, but the guy has been a force in trying to evolve the game.
3 new teams in the space of a few years - capitalizing on the Brisbane market, going back to Perth and taking advantage of a league heartland in PNG. The game is a lot quicker and prettier to the casual viewer with the new rules, as much as people want to whine, the low scoring wrestle dominated slogs of the 2010s weren't fun to watch for anyone that didn't have a deep understanding of the game already. The more attacking football you can produce, the better for the viewing experience. And going into new markets like Las Vegas and international round will bring so many more eyes and money to the sport.
Yes the NRL is probably not going to take off in the US or Saudi Arabia or whatever, but every incremental growth is good for the game. One thing PVL has not done is sit on his hands and just run the game like a politician, being a face for the game but actually doing basically nothing year on year, like the previous administrations. It is a slow death, innovation is what will keep the game alive.