According to GHA...

[Colin Zeal EFM]

...football is a gentleman's sport played by hooligans. Rugby is a hooligan sport played by gentlemen.

 

 

Three rugby league players, including two of the current Great Britain squad, have been jailed after being caught on camera brawling in the street.

 

Leeds Rhinos and England star Chev Walker, 20, was sent to a young offenders' institution for 18 months.

 

Rhino's team-mate and Great Britain squad member Ryan Bailey, 19, was also given nine months detention in a young offenders institution at Leeds Crown Court on Tuesday.

 

The third player, Rochdale Hornets' Paul Owen, 24, was jailed for 15 months for his part in a fight which broke out outside a Leeds night-club in July last year.

 

Another Leeds player, Dwayne Barker, 19, was ordered to do 150 hours of community service by Judge Paul Batty QC at Leeds Crown Court.

 

 

[EFM's Librarian]

I suspect he will claim some difference between Rugby league and Rubgy union, but good point anyway Zeal.

[Claire!]

DON'T LIKE RUGBY.

[Laz]

Is there a difference and does anyone other than the peanut-huggers care?

[Claire!]

prob not Laz,

[ESG]

IMO

there is a big difference

 

League is a sport, with skill and people who actually score tries

 

whereas

 

Union just a bunch of middle class estonian batsman playing "soggy biscuit" who spend the whole game kicking the ball and trying to get penalties...

[mdetaylor]

That is one of the finest descriptions of union I have seen.

 

League is indeed the finer product.

 

As far as Walker and Bailey are concerned it may have something to do with the water in Leeds (Bowyer, Woodgate, seat smashing fans) - they were apparently trying to protect a young lady.

[Laz]

Northern monkeys all.

[Little Miss Urchin]

See, this is what really pi**es me off. If the offenders were football equivalent they would get off with a slapped wrist and pathetic fine. But because they play a sport with only a fraction of the publicity, they get sentenced. (I'm not saying they shouldn't - first time I've heard about the case. Guess it must be because it won't sell as many papers as if they were footballers).

[EFM's Librarian]

Or perhaps it has something to do with one of them kicking somebody (who was already on the floor) in the head so hard, that he knocked him out.

[Little Miss Urchin]

How many top flight footballers have been punished in a suitable way? I can think of 1 - Tony Adams and look what it did to him. Maybe if we start treating these people for who they really are (i.e. people with skills) and not what the media has made them into (i.e. some sort of God-like being) then maybe, just maybe they might start behaving in the way they should and be roll-models to youngster as opposed to the pathetic upstarts some of them have become.

 

Was it Jody Morris who said to a bouncer 'Do you know who I am?' and all the sh*t about earning so much more then him. How about the Chelsea players who were messing around in front of the Americans just after 9/11? A little respect was called for I think. Problem is, they keep getting away with it.

 

Anyone who thinks they are above others should think before they act. An old cliché but non-the-less relevant here I think: What goes around comes around.

[EFM The Firm, The Voice]

There is a few diffrences

 

1. Bowyer and Woodgate were found not guilty - the rugger buugers were found guilty, I'm pretty sure if they were found guilty they would of gone down.

2. They were caught on CCTV giving somebody a good 'scrumming', people who kick people in the head deserve big sentances because as far as I'm concerned that's attempted murder. It's just a complete disregard for life.

3. Everyone whoes famous says 'do you know who I am', just say No!

4. You can't blame the Chelski players for that hotel thing, why should the whole world go morbid, they didn't know they were yanks. we played Basingstoke at home that night, I'm sure we were cracking jokes and having a laugh in the ground there may of been an american near us, we don't over - a complete over reaction.