Raiderdave wrote:Swans4ever wrote:- who cares 36% of NRL are islanders whats inclusive about that?
you do apparently you racist halfwit ....
the point is going to send you an e-mail soon
be on the watch for it
K f wit ?
What is racist about stating a fact - 36% of the NRL are islanders there used to be 11% Koori's now thats dropped to 5% - I think the question really is the NRL racist - do they not want Koori kids anymore - will you only have a chance at making the NRL if you are a Pacific Islander - is there a level playing field - is the game starting to appeal to only one group of the community? These stats should be causing some concern and has been since 2006!
Islanders in junior leagues, it's a really big issue
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July 16, 2006
Page 1 of 3 | Single page
Talent scouts love them but some huge, talented kids are changing the face of rugby codes, Daniel Lane writes.
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FORGET new rules, expansion teams and codes of conduct - the biggest influence on Australia's rugby codes has been the influx of Pacific Islanders. Some even say that it's inevitable the NRL and senior rugby union will soon be dominated by players with Tongan, Samoan or Maori blood.
This represents a fundamental shift in the way these century-old games have been played in Australia.
Rugby league and rugby union once attracted players with English, Irish and Aboriginal backgrounds. Later, they attracted players whose parents and grandparents came from Lebanon, Italy, Greece and Malta. Now Islanders with the perfect body shape for these power sports are beginning to dominate.
"The Islanders are emerging as a force because they generally have the qualities NRL talent scouts crave - size, speed and strength," says former rugby league international Mark Geyer, who coaches in the Penrith juniors. "It's like the NBA in the 1970s and '80s when African-Americans became the dominant players.
"People will have no choice but to accept it in league. The big thing is, these kids are Australians and I have no problem supporting them."
The impact has been felt even more at junior levels, with the emergence of bigger, faster and stronger players with islander roots making it difficult for smaller players to compete.
"The other week I saw a kid playing for the Blacktown City under 10s and he was 96 kilos," Geyer says. "While he was buggered after one or two runs, he only had to walk over the try line from five metres out, even though there were five or six kids hanging off him.
"It wasn't a contest and it can't be fun for him or the kids playing against him. The authorities must address the issue."
The ARU's high performance unit coach Manu Sutherland, himself an immigrant from New Zealand, agrees that size matters. While he says the Islanders and Polynesians have made such competitions as the NSW under-16 championships much faster and more physical than a decade ago, anecdotal evidence suggests non-islander parents are pulling their sons out of both codes because of concerns for their safety.
"I have no doubt it could be intimidating for some kids to play against the Islanders," Sutherland says. "The Pacific Islanders prefer to play together and it can be alarming for parents to see their kids come up against a team of them.
"It's a problem and there's no immediate answer. We're looking at all sorts of things, including weight-limit competitions.
So again what is racist about that!
And I am still waiting for that e-mail - if your going to threaten follow it up!
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