One Lion on a shirt....

So, Saturday saw Great Britain complete their first series whitewash since 1993 with a 3-0 victory of New Zealand. Much has been made by those who seek to knock the British game about the players the Kiwis were missing (Sonny Bill Williams, Benji Marshall etc) but injuries and unavailability are a fact of life in international sport and for the majority of the 240 minutes in this series the Kiwis were second best.

Great Britain played - particularly in the 44-0 Second Test win - with a flair and urgency not seen all too often under former coach Brian Noble. The offloading, expansive style Tony Smith applied successfully both this year and in 2004 at Leeds paid off with the team looking for opportunities to attack from good field position rather than simply completing sets and relying on the opposition making mistakes.

Several players stood up during this series over whom there had been potential question marks at international level. Leon Pryce - so often used in a utility role or as a winger - grabbed the stand off jersey and made it his own with two assured performances showing a keen footballing brain to go with his elusive running. Rob Burrow was supposed to get smashed all over the park by the rough, tough forwards at this level yet took on the organising role to such good effect, mixing it with his trademark quick feet and hitherto unseen field kicking game. Jamie Peacock led the pack from the front, never more so than his tempo-setting try 70 seconds into the Second Test, bumping off defenders and refusing to be stopped from getting over the line.

This series has been about both sides bringing in new players to key positions alongside some more experienced heads - Graham, Burrow, Clarke, Fa'asavalu, Burgess for GB, Perrett, Smith, Roberts, Lauaki and the like for the visitors. Home advantage or not, it is Britain's new blood that hit the ground running in this series and it bodes to well for the future. There will no doubt be further turnover in both squads prior to the 2008 World Cup with the likes of Keith Senior contemplating international retirement, but the fact that GB has used 23 players in this series shows that depth - once the achilles heel of British teams - is less of a worry now than it has been. Long may it remain so, if the Lion is to eventually challenge the Kiwi and the Kangaroo on a regular basis.

Four more years of hype

You nay have noticed there were a couple of games of rugby on over the weekend. Unless you've been living on Mars, in a cave, with your fingers in your ears that is.

Actually, you could be forgiven for thinking there was only one game on, which involved eight burly English chaps with names like George and Lawrence hiding a ball up their jerseys for 80 minutes only occasionally letting a fragile little chap called Jonny have it to kick it away again. Obviously this tactic worked a treat, as it bored their French opposition into a stupor and saw England's brave warriors reach a second successive World Cup final.

Earlier in the day at Old Trafford, the two best teams in Super League had put on a feast of running, handling and violent collisions which saw Leeds Rhinos crowned as champions for the second time in four years in the last game for coach Tony Smith before moving on. Of course by the time the late evening news bulletins came around, any focus on that particular sporting event watched by over 70,000 people was lost among the sort of blind patriotic jingoism that we English do so well.

Despite all the odds being stacked against them (in other words, they were rubbish heading into the tournament) our gallant English boys have found a way to win and now face South Africa for the glory of being the first side to retain the World Cup. That they found this way to win by completely removing all elements of risk, flair and entertainment from the game is secondary to the fact that after being crap for four years since the last World Cup they've started winning again. As usually happens with England teams in all sports, winning equals popular so expect the coming week to be a media barrage with all sorts of celebrities who wouldn't know a drop goal from a lineout expressing their delight and admiration for brave Sir Jonny and "the boys".

In a perverse way, England's progress to the final has demonstrated just what an appalling game to watch for the uninitiated rugby union really is. It's a sport where one team can win by being completely negative and choosing to stifle the opposition rather than looking to score points through pace, imagination and skill in the way the Rhinos did so well on Saturday. It's a game where the rolling maul is king, keeping the ball away from the opposition is paramount and hoofing it 40 yards off the pitch is greeted by rapturous applause. In short, it's the complete antithesis of everything you associate with rugby league. The two sports may have started from an identical root, but there respective evolutions have been as diverse as anything you would find in nature.

For all their brave noises after the last World Cup about playing a more expansive game, bringing in league talent in playing and coaching capacities and promising a red rose revolution, when put under pressure England have reverted to the sort of dour, plodding typecast that won them so few friends through the 1990s and into the new millenium. You know what though, as long as they keep winning the media will keep fawning and the Henrys and Nigels will keep turning up at Twickers (who knows, they may actually watch part of the game inbetween singing negro worksongs and sipping Pimms) and the world will stay on its twisted axis where the more entertaining product struggles to sell while the beige MDF flies off the shelves.

Sayonara Salford

The victory for Hull KR in the Hull derby settled the first major issue of the 2007 season last weekend, ensuring Salford will finish bottom of the pile and subject to whoever wins the National League One grand final will find themselves in that division for 2008.

On the face of it, this doesn't look much different from any other relegation in recent years. The club is making the usual encouraging noises about bouncing back. With their contracts rendered void by relegation, their better players are already being snapped up by other clubs - Luke Robinson and David Hodgson to Huddersfield while Andy Coley's move to Wigan, subject of much rumour for the last couple of years, has finally come to fruition.

This year of course is slightly different, with the automatic promotion route into the top flight closed and replaced by the franchise bidding process for 2009. Whereas before, keeping a full time squad would give you a great chance of returning at the first attempt, the option of securing promotion by results alone isn't going to be open to Salford and they will be bidding for one of an as yet unspecified number of places at the top table.

Much of Salford's hopes for a franchise will be pinned on their location. Their current home The Willows is in dire need of redevelopment. It's set in an unpleasant area, and has little in the way of modern facilities. Work is under way to move the club to a brand new purpose built stadium, the completion date for which is unclear. As part of the franchise application process, stadium quality will feature and it remains to be seen what the panel's view will be of Salford's proposal based at a stadium that has yet to be completed.

The other issue to be considered is catchment area. Although the north west is a hotbed of rugby league, Salford is/was the nearest thing to a Super League presence in Manchester. That gives it an enormous potential audience right on its doorstep. The club even shares its Red Devils nickname with Manchester United, and there has been talk of incorporating Manchester into the name over the years to identify the team with the sports mad city rather than the less salubrious suburb.

On the field the club has slumped dramatically this year after a promising season in 2006, with not even the replacement of Karl Harrison with Shaun McRae mid-season being enough to save them. Given the changes in structure, 2007 was the worst possible year to be relegated, and it remains to be seen whether the changes being made off the field will be sufficient to regain top flight status or whether it really is goodbye rather than see you later for the Reds

Walcome home...

... welcome, come on in and close the door.

Don't worry, this hasn't just turned into either a nostalgia blog or even a Peters and Lee fansite (ask your grandad).

This weekend the rugby league Challenge Cup final returned to its traditional home at Wembley Stadium, following some time on the road while the new national stadium was being constructed. With all due respect to Twickenham, Murrayfield and the Millenium Stadium who each in their own way were excellent hosts in the meantime, there's something about Wembley that just makes it "right" that the final should be back there.

In days of yore, the final used to be seen as a "grand day out" for northern fans to descend on the capital and play the tourist. As transport links have improved, that's obviously not so much of a big deal any more - you can be in London within 3 hours or so from the M62 corridor. The stadium has also been changed beyond all recognition, its historic twin towers replaced by an imposing arch. But even after all that, it's still Wembley, it's still special and it still has a mystique attached to it.

It's also one of the few showpiece occasions rugby league in this country has where it can display what it has to offer to a broad national media audience. The club game doesn't attract the column inches or free-to-air television time on a week to week basis so it needs occasions like the Challenge Cup final to put itself out there on view to a swathe of potential new fans.

That being the case - and I don't want to be a grinch here - it was a bit of a shame that the spectacle on the field didn't match the build up to it. Having Catalan Dragons in the final was an absolute boon for the RFL publicity machine. New team, new faces and the opportunity to show the world that rugby league is far removed from being cloth cap and whippets and is a growing, cosmopolitan sport. Sadly whether nerves of the occasion got to both teams or not we'll never know, but the first half was littered with errors and the game was effectively over as a contest with half an hour to go.

Still, with over 84,000 tickets sold, acres of positive press in the lead-up that would have cost a fortune to buy and the boost to the game in France that this final will have given all in all it still was a "grand day out" for rugby league.

Schadenfreude

It's German, dontcha know. Roughly translated it means "shameful joy", and its primary English use is as a term to describe finding fun in the misfortune of others.

Very popular around the north of England (and south of France for that matter) at the moment, thanks to the defeat of Wigan Warriors by Catalan Dragons in the Challenge Cup semi final this Sunday.

It's fair to say Wigan weren't the public favourites going into the game, for a variety of reasons. For a large chunk of the last decade of the 20th century, they swept all before them in both League and Cup, signing all the best players and paying them wages that no other team could compete with as they went on an unprecedented winning spree. Call it jealousy if you like, but the arrogance shown by the club and its fans over that period made them less than popular.

While success has been less easy to come by during the summer era, they've still found ways to make themselves unpopular. Running up a massive debt, the club was forced to sell its traditional Central Park home and move into the JJB Stadium with the local football club. There still lingers the perception that there is one rule for Wigan and one for everyone else, whether it's when their players visit the disciplinary panel for on-field indiscretions or the club itself being hauled over the coals for a flagrant breach of the salary cap in 2006, a year in which they narrowly avoided relegation by spending significantly more than they were allowed on wages.

When you're unpopular, it helps to have someone fronting the club to the media and general public who is likeable enough to deflect some of the flak. Unfortunately for Wigan, lately that job has fallen to Dave Whelan and Maurice Lindsay. The bluff, uncompromising (until it suits his principles) owner and his chairman - who possesses all the personal charm you'd get in the camp offspring of Joyce Grenfell and Baron Greenback from Dangermouse - aren't going to do Max Clifford out of a job when it comes to generating positive PR. It should come as no surprise then that the rugby league public have taken great delight in kicking the club while it's down.

It seems that this may have been the final straw, as Lindsay has announced today that he is stepping down as chairman at the end of the season and Whelan is considering a serious offer for the club. There's no doubt Lindsay played a significant part in making Wigan the club it is now - whether you consider that to be a good or a bad thing depends on how you look at it. There will be no shortage of people prepared to slam the door after the pair of them however, and it remains to be seen how long it will take to remove the taint off the image of the club that their era will be predominantly remembered for.