Traditional Sydney rugby league school replaced by team from Melbourne's outer suburbs
Date
May 1, 2015- 10:00PM
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Roy Masters
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The high school that unearthed a lode of rugby league talent in Benny Elias, Paul Sironen and more recently, Mitchell Moses, Luke Brooks and Curtis Sironen has withdrawn from NSW's top schoolboy competition, only to be replaced by a team from the outer suburbs of Melbourne.
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Holy Cross Ryde has exited the GIO Cup, an elite 12-school NSW competition, owing to its expected failure to be competitive in 2015, with Hallam Senior College in Melbourne, the school that produced NRL players Mahe Fonua and Kenny Bromwich, taking its place.
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Hallam, which played in the second-tier Schoolboy Trophy, a 260-school competition, has been promoted following success in the play-offs the past four years, including a televised semi-final last year. They will now meet Matraville Sports High school in mid-May, in a round-robin of traditional juggernauts, including Westfields Sports High and Patrician Brothers, Blacktown.
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Hallam will play Blacktown in a televised game in Melbourne on the eve of the second State of Origin match at the MCG.
>
This is a story with subplots: falling enrolments and the difficulty of inner-city schools competing with rosters of bigger players of Polynesian heritage; the rise of a rugby league factory in an AFL city; the implications of a coming rookie draft for the investment NRL clubs make in these elite sports schools and finally, a balance to the propaganda that the Giants are the only professional football team making inroads in what the AFL imperiously calls "the developing states".
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Holy Cross, runners-up seven times and winners in Elias's 1981 year, do not believe they can field a team to challenge in a strong pool.
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Balmain Junior League president John Critchley says, "Local funding for scholarships to Holy Cross has been dramatically reduced with the financial problems Balmain Tigers face."
>
Ryde's coach, Tim White, says the school will still compete in local inter-school competitions, playing 17 games. "We've got a weakened year 12 group but will have a good team next year."
>
A traditional middle-class school, White says Holy Cross has no front-rowers bigger than 85 kilograms. "Last year, we had props weighing 115kg, 120kg. One of them was recruited by Wests Tigers and he is bigger than anyone in the entire NRL club. Had we competed in the GIO Cup this year, we would have lined up against players at Blacktown weighing 110kg to 115kg. We'll put the GIO Cup on ice but we'll be back next year."
>
However, as Martin Meredith, the NRL's participation manager, says, "If Hallam are competitive, then Holy Cross might have to fight their way back."
>
Jamie Fardell, coach of Hallam, admits his team faces a formidable challenge but doesn't expect to disappear after a year.
>
"We are in a difficult pool but we are very excited about the future," he said. "I've got some good 16 year old kids coming though."
>
And Hallam has its own monster. "One of our boys is pushing 115kg. He's a rugby union boy in the Rebels program."
>
Meredith describes the impact of a proposed NRL rookie draft on NSW's specialist sports high schools as "a very vexed question".
>
The draft will force a rethink by NRL clubs of their investment in schools and local district junior league if under-18 talent is pooled, with lower-ranked NRL clubs taking the early picks of the best players.
>
The Panthers have close links with Patrician Brothers Blacktown; Wests Tigers with St Gregory's, Campbelltown and Holy Cross; the Sharks with Endeavour and the Eels with sports high schools at The Hills and Westfields.
>
One means of ensuring continuing investment in these schools, particularly those in Sydney's west, together with local district funding, is to quarantine one or two locals per NRL club from a rookie draft.
>
Matt Schubert, the NRL's school programs co-ordinator, says, "We're not sure about the impact of a draft. We're meeting soon with (the NRL's head of game development) Shane Richardson to discuss it. We're meeting with the school principals as well. The NRL clubs really support these schools."
>
Asked how rugby league at the elite level was competing with the millions of dollars poured in by the AFL in the vast territory of the GWS Giants, Schubert said, "Our school programs are definitely on the up in western Sydney."
>
The reality is that, in terms of schoolboy games played on an adult-sized field with senior rules, as opposed to kids playing modified rules, there are probably more participants in rugby league in outer Melbourne than with AFL in western Sydney.
>
http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/league-news/traditional-sydney-rugby-league-school-replaced-by-team-from-melbournes-outer-suburbs-20150501-1mxsmk.html
Date
May 1, 2015- 10:00PM
>
Roy Masters
>
The high school that unearthed a lode of rugby league talent in Benny Elias, Paul Sironen and more recently, Mitchell Moses, Luke Brooks and Curtis Sironen has withdrawn from NSW's top schoolboy competition, only to be replaced by a team from the outer suburbs of Melbourne.
>
Holy Cross Ryde has exited the GIO Cup, an elite 12-school NSW competition, owing to its expected failure to be competitive in 2015, with Hallam Senior College in Melbourne, the school that produced NRL players Mahe Fonua and Kenny Bromwich, taking its place.
>
Hallam, which played in the second-tier Schoolboy Trophy, a 260-school competition, has been promoted following success in the play-offs the past four years, including a televised semi-final last year. They will now meet Matraville Sports High school in mid-May, in a round-robin of traditional juggernauts, including Westfields Sports High and Patrician Brothers, Blacktown.
\
\
Hallam will play Blacktown in a televised game in Melbourne on the eve of the second State of Origin match at the MCG.
>
This is a story with subplots: falling enrolments and the difficulty of inner-city schools competing with rosters of bigger players of Polynesian heritage; the rise of a rugby league factory in an AFL city; the implications of a coming rookie draft for the investment NRL clubs make in these elite sports schools and finally, a balance to the propaganda that the Giants are the only professional football team making inroads in what the AFL imperiously calls "the developing states".
>
Holy Cross, runners-up seven times and winners in Elias's 1981 year, do not believe they can field a team to challenge in a strong pool.
>
Balmain Junior League president John Critchley says, "Local funding for scholarships to Holy Cross has been dramatically reduced with the financial problems Balmain Tigers face."
>
Ryde's coach, Tim White, says the school will still compete in local inter-school competitions, playing 17 games. "We've got a weakened year 12 group but will have a good team next year."
>
A traditional middle-class school, White says Holy Cross has no front-rowers bigger than 85 kilograms. "Last year, we had props weighing 115kg, 120kg. One of them was recruited by Wests Tigers and he is bigger than anyone in the entire NRL club. Had we competed in the GIO Cup this year, we would have lined up against players at Blacktown weighing 110kg to 115kg. We'll put the GIO Cup on ice but we'll be back next year."
>
However, as Martin Meredith, the NRL's participation manager, says, "If Hallam are competitive, then Holy Cross might have to fight their way back."
>
Jamie Fardell, coach of Hallam, admits his team faces a formidable challenge but doesn't expect to disappear after a year.
>
"We are in a difficult pool but we are very excited about the future," he said. "I've got some good 16 year old kids coming though."
>
And Hallam has its own monster. "One of our boys is pushing 115kg. He's a rugby union boy in the Rebels program."
>
Meredith describes the impact of a proposed NRL rookie draft on NSW's specialist sports high schools as "a very vexed question".
>
The draft will force a rethink by NRL clubs of their investment in schools and local district junior league if under-18 talent is pooled, with lower-ranked NRL clubs taking the early picks of the best players.
>
The Panthers have close links with Patrician Brothers Blacktown; Wests Tigers with St Gregory's, Campbelltown and Holy Cross; the Sharks with Endeavour and the Eels with sports high schools at The Hills and Westfields.
>
One means of ensuring continuing investment in these schools, particularly those in Sydney's west, together with local district funding, is to quarantine one or two locals per NRL club from a rookie draft.
>
Matt Schubert, the NRL's school programs co-ordinator, says, "We're not sure about the impact of a draft. We're meeting soon with (the NRL's head of game development) Shane Richardson to discuss it. We're meeting with the school principals as well. The NRL clubs really support these schools."
>
Asked how rugby league at the elite level was competing with the millions of dollars poured in by the AFL in the vast territory of the GWS Giants, Schubert said, "Our school programs are definitely on the up in western Sydney."
>
The reality is that, in terms of schoolboy games played on an adult-sized field with senior rules, as opposed to kids playing modified rules, there are probably more participants in rugby league in outer Melbourne than with AFL in western Sydney.
>
http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/league-news/traditional-sydney-rugby-league-school-replaced-by-team-from-melbournes-outer-suburbs-20150501-1mxsmk.html
