Ok so I grew up racing home from soccer or footy training to watch the State of O. I loved watching O’Connor kick from the sideline in the wet, Brett Kenny’s brilliance, the Wally chant going up, Langer getting flown back to win the series for Qland, Et and Mark Mcgaw, Fittler coming out of retirement to win us the series. I’m sure you have many more memories. SOO has been a marketers dream- state against state and mate against mate and all that. It seems now though it has taken over this part of the season and the NRL becomes a little stale and a sideline event. The SOO games mean little more than pride and yet cause major disruption to many teams season. Is it still worth all the hype? Is the footy what it once was?
Whilst it generates so much income it will never stop and even though I now live in NZ I try and watch the games. I just wondered what people thought? Are we being driven by the marketing or is it as good as they’d have us believe?
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Mate haven’t watched Origin with any enthusiasm since they banned the shoulder charge and the biff . They market it as a war yet officiate it as a game of hopscotch. It’s lost it’s edge . Origin was a game where you rarely knew what was gunna happen next because one big hit or one fight could flip the whole game on its head , now it’s just like watching a very boring NRL game .
Funny how the best highlights reels they show are all of the old days .
No, it's a marketing ploy and has been since day 1. There was already a yearly NSW v QLD competition for many years, but QLD was far too weak to compete with NSW, so they changed the rules in QLD's favour. Unfortunately they went way overboard with initially most games being played in QLD, with a referee from QLD lower grades. Even players who should have played for NSW were blatantly selected for QLD.
To bring this back to the game today, if this a game between two states, why are we playing in a third state who don't even know the difference between League and Union? Whilst still a good spectacle most of the time, I think most NSW supporters are a little jaded by the whole concept.
State Of origin is about to fall off a cliff and nobody in charge seems to see that cliff looming.
The problem is the huge number of NRL players who are ineligible to play it meaning it is no long "the best versus the best" - not even close. The NRL needs to accept that times have changed and start treating "The Blues" and "The Maroons" like any other modern sporting franchises. They need to allocate the territories to the states and nominate who a player is eligible to play for when they make their NRL debut.
Punters are used to fans having a bizillion outsiders in their teams and it would be no different with State of Origin. Punters support the team - not the players in the team.
Imagine how much better it would be with the likes of Sam Burgess, Shaun Johnson and all the other inelligible elite players competing. It would be the very best versus the very best - like it used to be back in the day.
Instead it's a flaccid version of it's once former glorious self being flogged to death by the short sighted ignorant nimrods running the game.
Really what was all the fuss about Fifita then?
New Zealand? England?
If they want it to be the best v the best EVERY player in the NRL needs to be eligible to play for one of the franchises (or states, as they are currently known).
You change the format and it loses the point.
I get your point on Sam Burgess but people used to say the same on sbw and even others like Adrian Morley. You change the format and you lose the whole purpose, that is "origin".
Definition: the point or place where something begins, arises, or is derived.
Don't get me wrong I'm well aware players like Inglis are in the wrong team and then there's the argument Tahu was born in Melbourne, he should've played for Victoria Har har. But there's rules in place now that I think will fix these issues to some extent and going the complete other direction of open slather will kill it very very quickly.
I hear you mate. I get the whole State v State thing but I reckon if they don't make changes it will end up on the scrap heap.
To remain relevant it needs to be the pinnacle of the game - otherwise it becomes city v country in a different guise. Most players say they love playing Origin because it's the toughest, most skillful footy in the game - we need to make sure that is not lost.
It will always be NSW v Queensland. It's like Parra - we support the jersey/club, not the player. I HATED Beau Scott for a decade but once he pulled on the B&G I loved him.
In all honesty, I thought the 2017 World Cup was more entertaining than 2017 Origin.
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