Aussies on top
MICHAEL HENDERSON
you may not know it — indeed, if you live south of Lancashire and Yorkshire, you may be very surprised to find out — but there is another rugby contest going on at the moment. In Australia it is all very different, Although most British eyes are on the union World Cup taking place over there, the 15-man game is far less popular down under than 13-man league, so, while we are wondering whether England can beat France and go on to win the tournament, they are taking a keen interest in what is going on over here.
And what is going on over here? Australia are on top, as usual. It is three decades since Great Britain beat the Aussies in a Test series, and the green and gold took a lead in the latest contest, winning the first game of three 22-18 at Wigan after England's Sydney-based forward, Adrian Morley, was sent off for foul play after only 12 seconds. It's not really the brightest thing to do, being dismissed for your first tackle, when you are playing the strongest side in the world. Great Britain must now win the next two matches. and history suggests that they have only one victory in them.
There are those who will tell you that the Australian side that came here in 1982 was the finest rugby team, of either code, they have ever seen. Certainly union has learnt a lot from the more mobile league code, where handling skills arc superior. England have co-opted Jason Robinson, the former league player, into their back division, and enlisted Phil Larder, an old league hand, as one of their coaches. Australia, the world champions, who meet New Zealand in the other semi-final this weekend, have roped in three players from league.
The traffic used to go the other way. League, the professional game, raided union for many of its finest players, though it would be stretching a point to say that union was ever a completely amateur game. There was a lot of boot money flying about, and other forms of payment in kind, as prominent club members found jobs for favoured men. There was mutual suspicion, often based on snobbery, and it raises a laugh in league circles today when union types espouse 'professional' attitudes, as if they had nurtured them all their lives.
The truth is, they drummed anybody tainted with the paid code out of their club-houses, and hounded them for consorting with the enemy, Nigel StarmerSmith, the veteran commentator, who is covering this World Cup for ITV with his customary expertise, once referred to league as 'something other than rugby union'. He couldn't bring himself to put a handle on the jug! It was a wretched business. Thank goodness it is over (by and large).
At the very highest level, union is the better game. At club level, league usually wins hands down. Anybody who has ever come into contact with league knows that the people who play and watch it are some of the best folk in the whole of sport. It has remained a working man's game, full of blood, gore and mutual respect, and the crowds are both well behaved and funny. Years ago, when the Keighley groundsman enabled a game to go ahead on a frosty ground by spearing the turf all week long with his fork, the club chairman praised him thus in the match programme: 'Hats off to Bert. Forking well done, lad!'
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