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Showing posts from July, 2022

The History of Rugby League In France (Tuesday 26th July 2022)

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 French Rugby League has a tumultuous history and it's fair to say the sport in France has been through a lot. However, not many know that their history began all the way back in the 1870s. That was when Rugby Union was first introduced in France, and it quickly grew amongst rural, southern areas of France. When the Rugby Union and Northern Union, which would later become Rugby League, split in 1895, France decided to stay with the Home Nation unions. However, their quickly became allegations of professionalism and onfield violence in French internationals, which led to their suspension from Rugby Union's Five Nations Championship in 1931. This is what paved the way for Rugby League to be introduced in France. Harry Sunderland and the British RFL worked to get an Australia v Great Britain test to be held in Paris, after an earlier attempt in the 1931-32 Kangaroos tour was refused by the FFR. They got their goal as Australia and Britain played an exhibition match at Paris' S...

Hull FC: A sinking ship or one on the rise? (Saturday 23rd July 2022)

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Last night was a disappointing night for all involved with Hull FC. Conceding 38 points in one half is unacceptable, let alone when you had the lead at the break. The red card for Ligi Sao only compounded the disappointment. The team showed a lack of desire and fight, and we're ultimately an embarrassment. You look at the stats and see that we have now conceded 196 points in the month of July. It wasn't a one off thing, it was something that has been consistent throughout the month. What is the more worrying part is that this has happened for 4 of the last 5 seasons. Under Radford, we lost our last 11 games in 2018, and our end to 2019 was also abysmal. 2020 was good under Andy Last, but last year was also a poor end, with us losing 9 of our final 10 games. This makes it clear then that this problem is not new. So why would you sack Hodgson? Radford failed to get the players pumped up for his last few seasons. That's why we saw results like 80-10 to Warrington and 72-10 to ...

Predicting the final Super League Table (Sunday 17th July 2022)

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 Hello and welcome back to my blog. It's that time of the year again. It's the Super League run in. There are eight games left of the year but there is so much still to be decided. Toulouse and Wakefield are still locked in an intense battle to decide who will be relegated. There is a very tight race for the play offs, with all the teams between 5th and 10th fighting to make it in. Although it looks like Saints have bridged a big enough gap now to get the League Leaders Shield, 2nd place (and the other team to get a bye through the first week of the play offs with Saints) is still being fiercely contested between Wigan Warriors, Huddersfield Giants and the Catalans Dragons. In this blog, I will predict every game left this season and then tally up the points to get the final table. If I've learnt anything this year, it's that I am not great at predictions so this will probably be miles off. However, it's just a bit of fun, so I hope you enjoy it. The winning team wi...