There are higher quality super league games than todays Origin IMO

Gareth widdop half back at melbourne, woe a brit in a key position at a nrl club

If they pick enough NSW players we'll have a good chance! They were shocking!

One reason why it's that far behind is because you get the 'golden boys' over here, pampered, untouched, over-hyped, piggybacked etc.

Gallen was nothing special two years ago, in the same way Hayne was untouchable then and anonymous now. Some players just have purple patches.

But you're right, we are screwed. The real proof was St.George-Manly last week. Manly have been winning every week, but St George put them under such pressure and just wouldn't let them play. Manly suddenly looked a poor side, which they obviously aren't. SuperLeague's best might put on a good show against casual defenders and no hopers, but they can't cope with that intensity without making errors.

People need to learn the difference between "entertaining" and "quality".



Yes, the SL is fun to watch but thats because in general, the outside backs cant defend or read opposition attacking plays which leads to higher scores and nice looking tries. Now dont get me wrong, there are some average games over there and some average players. In general though the defensive capabilities across the board are better. This in turn makes the half backs better and the outside backs better because they have to work for their tries/good plays.



No team from the SL would get near the top 4 over there. I'd even go as far as saying every team would struggle to score against the Saints. Even the top Aussie teams struggle.



We DO have some very talented players over here though but what it all boils down to IMO is poor coaching. My case can be led by 2 clubs... Wigan and Huddersfield. Defensively they are better than everyone else (Hudds were until they played Wigan) and in Wigans case, they are the best team in the league. Huddersfield have come out of no where in the last 3 years and are now soundly a top 4 team. Also both these teams play with a structure in attack and not much of this "off the cuff" style which is nice when it works, but wont win you games against well drilled defensive teams (see Leeds). Now, what do both these teams have in common? Whats taken them from also rans to contenders/winners?..



A good coaching system that has come through the NRL. We could do a lot worse than to send some coaches over there to learn the techneques because until we do, the SL in general wont be able to compete with the NRL.

I have seen some pretty bland NRL games this year and some pretty goo ESL ones. SoO III was the least skillfull of the three games IMO and both teams lacked concentration in defense at times.

England just need to believe........and threads like this go some way to explaining why they often get tonked by the crims.......you have them beaten before a ball is kicked

TBF I thought about this same thing when watching the game. My honest thoughts were that we'd give NSW a decent game but QLD would have too much out wide for us to compete.

Possibly....but in an alternate reality, Qlnd would tonk Australia. That is the best SoO side in the eyes of many. Difference is, whilst Slater is a great SoO player, he craps himself at the sight of a Kiwi Shirt. Likewise a few others in the Qlnd team.......Australia are not all that. England just need to believe (and get a decent coach FFS).

TBF that Q'land back line is one of the best back lines of all time. No shame in not being able to match it, NSW (+Fiji) are not even close and look at how strong the game is in that state. As said $millions goes into Jnr RL in NSW and Q'land, probably 100 times more money than is spent on jnr RL in UK so no surprise.



re sending coaches over to Oz, hasn't SL been full of Australian coaches for the last 15 years?



If you are going to match Oz you would need to:



1. Open up a load of casinos with money sapping bandits in council estates across the country. yes it will deprive children of food and clothing but there will be plenty of money for Jnr RL.

2. Give residency visas to Kiwis and islanders and encourage them to all move to Leeds. Worked for Western Sydney!

My new sig

Out of interest, has Bluey got a job down under yet?

Watched a recording of the game last night with a football fan who i'm converting to RL by watching weekly SL matches, he commented that the State of Origin was like watching in fast-forward, when the recording finished we switched the Wigan game on and that was in slow motion in comparison.



He also commented that he didn't realise how big a game rugby league was in Australia and commented a few times about the crowd.

To draw a comparison between Gooners/Cas and the biggest Origin fixture ever is hardly sensible, and a tad pointless, though? You could equally compare it with some of the dull-as-ditchwater NRL fare we have seen this season