C’mon Scotland

The rules may be more complicated than football.

As they are for cricket, American Football etc.

I watch Rugby Union every week on BT. I watch international rugby and think it's a better sport to watch than international football.

You don't know anything much about it. Yet you say it's crap.

Try and learn the rules. Make an effort. Then say it's crap. Once you understand.

 

I'm getting a right telling off and no mistake.

It might be worth you reading my reply to Hooky, or not, up to you.

But no amount of shouting at me changes that rugby is a niche sport enjoyed more as a day out than as a spectacle in itself.

 

82000 watched Harlequins play Wasps in December 2018. A league match.

The majority of top league rugby union teams have greater home attendances than Barnsley F.C.

A niche sport then, are we, in Barnsley?

The British television audience peaked at 15 million viewers, making it the most watched sports program of 2003 - the Rugby World Cup. Niche sport.

Plus you seem to think that rugby's more of a social event than serious sport.

Try playing it and report back afterwards.

Plus try telling your average Barnsley fan that the Saturday experience is only about the football and not about the booze and the experience and the fun of it, win or lose.

 

Pretty sure Barnsley isn't the only place football is watched in the world. Care to use the argument you've just put forward to give the aggregate attendance of football games throughout the world on any given weekend and that of rugby union. Just stick to England if you like.

Not a great argument, is it?

And you still haven't got it.

 

Is your argument that football is a more universal sport than rugby?

Of course it is.

I'm not slagging football off. You're slagging rugby off.

And your only basis for such slagging now seems to be that there aren't so many countries that play it as there are football. And each week the crowds are bigger .Oh and the rules are too complicated.

Well they don't play cricket all round the world either, or indeed most other sports. so presumably they're all crap too. And niche sports - they're all crap cos enough people don't turn up to watch them. As if "niche" is a derogatory term anyway. They're all crap.

Just cos you don't take the time to understand the rules.

 

As I said you really should read my response to Hooky and try to learn when someone doesn't care and is just half heartedly winding you up.

Not that it matters but I used to play rugby.

 

Perhaps you took too many blows on the head. It serves as a plausible explanation.

Just jesting

 

One thing I don’t understand and really haven’t a clue as to how they come about it. Why the names.
Saracens
Harlequins
Wasps.
Obviously associated with somewhere. but where. I would prefer a name related to where their fans come from and let us all know of their identity.
For me league is a much better spectacle. And as I said before I really never had an allegiance to either. Just picking up on em through the yrs. I’d genuinely rather watch American football than union. Each to their own.
As for the other 2 American biggies. Baseball and Basketball. I wouldn’t cross the street to watch. Suppose they’d say the same about Cricket.

 

Went to the Yankees Stadium to watch a baseball match about 5 years ago. I enjoyed it because the beer was close and the evening balmy. Wife was bored stiff - early exit.

Went to watch the Daytona Coke 400 - cars going round and round for ever, making loud noises. Beer was close, wife again bored stiff, but I was too. Yanks were well into it. Early exit

I'm nearly 6'6" so 45+ years or so ago basketball was a bit of a natural sport. Tried it but the constant whistle blowing for contact etc. put me off it.

Used to like Rugby League (dad from Featherstone) but now prefer Union. Preferred league internationals when we were GB.

Union is going the wrong way in that you don't see backs making the same breaks anymore. Today was a good example.

You can call e.g. Wasps - London Wasps for i.d. purposes. As Mick might say, "that went well". Given where they are now.

p.s. cricket - I love international 5 day cricket but who watches - who has ever gone to watch for any length of time - proper county cricket.

 

Nah, I was rubbish and a bit timid.

What you said about playing it... It's a brutal game and requires an amazing skill set. But that doesn't necessarily make it a great spectator sport.

And me calling it niche wasn't supposed to be derogatory. I'm all for niche.

My only point in this is I do think rugby would suffer from an extended lockdown. What you've taken as a criticism, and with good reason from the way I phrased it, is the atmosphere within the rugby supporting community. It's amazing. I've been to rugby games and loved them. It's what it should sell itself on. It's never going to be as appealing as football just as a sport, but as a game where there's no play acting, where every player respects the authority of the referee, where everyone in the crowd is there to enjoy themselves with not even a whiff of violence, it has a lot offer. But it's a sport to be there for rather than watch on TV, and it's a very good example of why we have to get out of this horrific lockdown we're in.

 

Well I do agree on referees. Football referees should be like Rugby referees - who explain their decisions and brook no backchat or playacting.

Rugby VAR works well - if you're watching on TV the ref and the ones in the caravan explain their thought processes. It's not perfect but it's better than football.

It is pathetic to see grown men howling in anguish at the slightest touch, and asking for others to be booked etc. Without sanction. What about being booked for groaning in the tackle (unless you have to be stretchered off)?

Booking for swearing, or challenging a decision unless you're the captain.

Get some discipline in the game. I've never understood how footballers get away with it. Moaning and faking.

 

Can't agree about the old Twickenham being a crumbling ruin...I certainly don't remember anything like that, traditional perhaps , but at least equal to any football stadium of its day.
We went to England v Wales and Ireland probably the previous year, and I thought it was utterly fantastic, the old slab sides stands rather like the centre court at Wimbledon generated an atmosphere like I've never experienced before or since and that includes Wembley both old and new.

 

Perhaps I slightly overstated it but I remember quite a few bits of terrace with chunks of concrete missing.

 

Maybe the sin bin could be the answer to football's discipline problems? Challenge a ref's decision or feign injury and you end up sat in the cold for 10 minutes.

 

On reflection Brush....I probably understated it....or perhaps we just went in the best parts, North and East stands if I remember rightly. I was reading an article last night that said that at that time the RFU had wanted to rebuild the South Stand but the local council were being obstructive on the matter.

 

Lets call it a draw then...

 

No, tbh you're probably right....It seemed great to me, and the atmosphere aspect I've never experienced since but I'd forgotten...shortly afterwards the RFU launched a debenture scheme to fund a new stadium...my old man thought about taking it up, it gave you the right to have first option to buy your seat ticket for the next X number of years....but it was incredibly expensive and hardly anyone took it up, a few years after they relaunched the plan with more realistic prices. I've still got the brochure in the loft.

 

And your still welcome Ian. Ignore the Fev fans. Going there would be the equivalent of going to Glebe Park.

 

Cheers mate. I have an open mind but who knows when a visit can be arranged?
Hard to see any football or rugby being open to the public this season.

 

Do Fev have a hedge?