One of the most alarming things evident last night imo was the physical difference between the teams. Pretty much every Aussie appeared bigger & stronger than his opponent. I lost count of the number of times Thaiday, Gallen, Yow Yeh etc were able to dominate the initial contact & left one of our guys on the floor.
Tony Williams was fairly quiet last night, but his swatting of Chris Heighington at Wembley was Mal Meninga / Les Dyl all over again. Only injury prevented Jamal Idris & Dave Taylor from playing the 4N. You can probably add Ryan James in a season or two. These guys are monsters compared to anything in SL. Why haven't we got players like this?

Genetics. Islanders are naturally big they wudnt even need to hit the gym to be big and athletic!

Time to send scouts to Ramsey, Douglas and Peel?

Give some couples of Polynesian passports with the agreement they have many kids lol

It's all about player supply - ie numbers playing the game. We should give all RL clubs targets for the number of junior teams playing in meaningful clubs / leagues in their areas. Going into primary schools for a day is no good. Development needs to translate into regular participation. You need to see kids playing rugby with their mates in the park / in the streets. I know I live in the South these days but when I go home I rarely see kids playing rugby in an informal environment. That's something that has changed enormously over the years. We all used to do that every day.

who said SL is a "bore fest! strewth having watched NRL on tv and live I know which comp i want to watch and lets put it this way it is northern hemis!
if we have to go to Southern hemis style of play to beat the aussies in internationals then sod it i am happy to keep losing to them
The NRL is pretty dull to watch, the atmos at NRL games i have been to is graveyard!!
The 2 ref thing is pants

SL is a damn fine product

Big differnce with why the games are different, whats the pay scales north and south???

That's sort of my point. The league has promoted more and more of the Australia wrestling at the play the ball in an attempt to catch the Aussies. Ten years ago the game was far more exciting to watch

We need to have a more intense competition, less games. I would reduce SL to 11 clubs so clubs only play 20 games instead of 27. I would also like to see overseas quota reduced 2nd rate aussies ruining our game stopping young players develop. And put overseas coaches on quota!

so reduce SL to 11 clubs, does that not then mean there is a smaller pool of players to choose from who are playing at that level?