Sinfield to leave game : Thu Jun 17, 2021 9:09 am  

According to Total RL (https://www.totalrl.com/kevin-sinfields ... confirmed/) Kev Sinfield is heading off to Leicester RU to join the defence staff. Okay ... as a Wigan fan, he was the skipper of a great Leeds team, and on the field at least, a big rival of ours. But no one can fault what a great leader he was and how much he put into RL. I won't pretend that I don't absolutely hate it when sons of RL leave for RU, especially those who made such an impact. I don't know what the situation is at Leeds, and from some of Sinfield's comments it doesn't sound as if all is well, at least not from his perspective. So I'm not criticising anyone personally, but at a time when British RL feels as if it's slipping towards semi-amateur status, can we really afford to keep losing expertise? An argument may be put that he wasn't that good at what he was doing. I don't know. But I felt the same way when Waney left for Scottish RU. I harboured no resentment towards him. He'd done a great job for us and deserved to go where the money was. But isn't it depressing that RL never seems to tick that box? Waney is now back, but others left permanently. What is it about RL that it doesn't seem to fight to keep its people?

According to Total RL (https://www.totalrl.com/kevin-sinfields ... confirmed/) Kev Sinfield is heading off to Leicester RU to join the defence staff. Okay ... as a Wigan fan, he was the skipper of a great Leeds team, and on the field at least, a big rival of ours. But no one can fault what a great leader he was and how much he put into RL. I won't pretend that I don't absolutely hate it when sons of RL leave for RU, especially those who made such an impact. I don't know what the situation is at Leeds, and from some of Sinfield's comments it doesn't sound as if all is well, at least not from his perspective. So I'm not criticising anyone personally, but at a time when British RL feels as if it's slipping towards semi-amateur status, can we really afford to keep losing expertise? An argument may be put that he wasn't that good at what he was doing. I don't know. But I felt the same way when Waney left for Scottish RU. I harboured no resentment towards him. He'd done a great job for us and deserved to go where the money was. But isn't it depressing that RL never seems to tick that box? Waney is now back, but others left permanently. What is it about RL that it doesn't seem to fight to keep its people?

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Thu Jun 17, 2021 9:42 am  

It all comes down to money.

No player would go to RU if they got paid more in RL. No coach would go to RU if they got paid more in RL. Money talks and sadly, rugby league doesn’t have much of it.

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Thu Jun 17, 2021 10:05 am  

FIOS wrote:

It all comes down to money.

No player would go to RU if they got paid more in RL. No coach would go to RU if they got paid more in RL. Money talks and sadly, rugby league doesn’t have much of it.

Yeah, I fear it all comes down to that.

But it's amazing how we never came up short in relation to the RFL administrators' salaries.

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Thu Jun 17, 2021 10:06 am  

An absolute huge loss imo. The guy has developed a bit of a national profile with his recent charity efforts. That's now lost, along with his passion and knowledge for the game. He'll be a success at Leicester and he'll transition into other roles within that sport. Btw, the finances of RU club sides, on the whole, aren't great https://www.therugbypaper.co.uk/latest-news/32558/a-record-44-4m-in-losses-premiership-club-figures-revealed/ The difference is they encourage their money men to spend and invest. The owner of Bristol Bears (who've just finished top of the league) was welcomed and allowed to spend his cash. Remember what happened to Koucash, we vilified and laughed at him. You only need to look at our club. Plenty are happy to see us cut our cloth next year and see balancing of the books as a good thing. That approach is a pipedream, especially for any sport outside of football. We'll never get enough revenue in to do that.

An absolute huge loss imo. The guy has developed a bit of a national profile with his recent charity efforts. That's now lost, along with his passion and knowledge for the game. He'll be a success at Leicester and he'll transition into other roles within that sport. Btw, the finances of RU club sides, on the whole, aren't great https://www.therugbypaper.co.uk/latest-news/32558/a-record-44-4m-in-losses-premiership-club-figures-revealed/ The difference is they encourage their money men to spend and invest. The owner of Bristol Bears (who've just finished top of the league) was welcomed and allowed to spend his cash. Remember what happened to Koucash, we vilified and laughed at him. You only need to look at our club. Plenty are happy to see us cut our cloth next year and see balancing of the books as a good thing. That approach is a pipedream, especially for any sport outside of football. We'll never get enough revenue in to do that.

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Thu Jun 17, 2021 3:41 pm  

Cruncher wrote:

British RL feels as if it's slipping towards semi-amateur status

I don't disgree with much of what you wrote but this is just not the case. There's a lot of moaning about the state of the game that I feel sometimes makes people think it's worse off than it actually is.

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Thu Jun 17, 2021 3:46 pm  

The Ghost of '99 wrote:

I don't disgree with much of what you wrote but this is just not the case. There's a lot of moaning about the state of the game that I feel sometimes makes people think it's worse off than it actually is.

Of the three teams with a decent chance of coming up, two of them are semi-pro. On that basis I'd say he's correct. Then how long before the likes of Salford and Hull KR opt to do the same?

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Thu Jun 17, 2021 11:25 pm  

I don’t get this “he’s a great loss” line personally.

I’m his role as an administrator both the national team and his club team have lost ground on their rivals.

I may be wrong but I’m sure he had a go at coaching and was poor and decided to not stick at that.

A great player yes and a great ambassador for rugby league absolutely and I’m sure he always will be the latter.

There are many more former League players in Union making a go of it in Union who never got as many chances to as he did in life after the game who are probably bigger misses.

I wish him all the best and hope he is a great success but let’s not pretend he has been anything other than average in his post playing roles in our code.

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Fri Jun 18, 2021 8:15 am  

jonh wrote:

I don’t get this “he’s a great loss” line personally.

I’m his role as an administrator both the national team and his club team have lost ground on their rivals.

I may be wrong but I’m sure he had a go at coaching and was poor and decided to not stick at that.

A great player yes and a great ambassador for rugby league absolutely and I’m sure he always will be the latter.

There are many more former League players in Union making a go of it in Union who never got as many chances to as he did in life after the game who are probably bigger misses.

I wish him all the best and hope he is a great success but let’s not pretend he has been anything other than average in his post playing roles in our code.

As I said, I don't know whether Sinfield was any good at what he did, or not. I was using him as an example of how the drift of expertise only ever seems to be one way. So I've no argument with you at all on the lower profile losses.

I'm quite convinced that by the early 1990s, British RL was streets ahead of British RU in terms of training, match day strategies, player prep, game plans, entertainment value etc. But RU seemed to catch onto that and tried to put it right by plundering as much RL coaching and backroom talent as possible. And they're still doing it (they've only stopped signing our best players because RL lads now see it as equally lucrative but much more of a challenge to go to the NRL).

My knowledge on this is not exhaustive, so I could be wrong ... but I can't think of a single ex-RU coach, trainer, administrator etc currently occupying a high profile position in British RL.

That said, I don't know if there are any we'd want, but the one-way traffic that seemed to commence at the dawn of the 2000s is still going strong. And as you point out, we are losing more and more talent.

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Fri Jun 18, 2021 8:39 am  

His efforts in fundraising for his mate Rob Burrow have been immense and I absolutely think he deserves to officially be known as Sir Kev now.

I agree it’s always sad to see big league figures leave for Union but I don’t think he’ll be a big miss for Leeds based on the job he seems to have done there or the job he did internationally. Tough to make a real call on it as it’s that type of role where you can hide away from the flak a bit and the head coach gets the stick but on face value there were some pretty poor decisions made.

Re: Sinfield to leave game : Fri Jun 18, 2021 8:55 am  

Cruncher wrote:

As I said, I don't know whether Sinfield was any good at what he did, or not. I was using him as an example of how the drift of expertise only ever seems to be one way. So I've no argument with you at all on the lower profile losses.

I'm quite convinced that by the early 1990s, British RL was streets ahead of British RU in terms of training, match day strategies, player prep, game plans, entertainment value etc. But RU seemed to catch onto that and tried to put it right by plundering as much RL coaching and backroom talent as possible. And they're still doing it (they've only stopped signing our best players because RL lads now see it as equally lucrative but much more of a challenge to go to the NRL).

My knowledge on this is not exhaustive, so I could be wrong ... but I can't think of a single ex-RU coach, trainer, administrator etc currently occupying a high profile position in British RL.

That said, I don't know if there are any we'd want, but the one-way traffic that seemed to commence at the dawn of the 2000s is still going strong. And as you point out, we are losing more and more talent.

They have far more money than we do as a sport so the movement will only be one way in the same way nobody left RL in the early 90s to play RU. Not to mention that if you actually do become a success, the International game poops all over ours with 80k sell outs (even when they play a 2nd string against the likes of Fiji, Samoa, Japan) and a regular solid competition.