Age-Grade U.S. Final Made in Hollywood

In the USA Rugby age-grade finals today, powerhouse Highland won the U-19 boy's national championship by thrashing Utah United 41-5. The championship will surely be a great ad for Forever Strong, an upcoming Hollywood film that loosely dramatizes events from Highland's history. Below is an extended "sneak peek" at the movie:



As Armchair Playmaker explained earlier in the week, there is also a boy's high school championship, which is for programs from one school while the U-19 title is for programs with players from multiple schools. Jesuit of Sacramento (California) won that title. The girl's U-19 grand final is tomorrow.

Best Grand Final of the Weekend: U.S. Super League?

In a weekend packed with rugby union grand finals, the thriller of the weekend may have been played on an unlikely ground. Sure, the Super 14 and Guinness Premiership finished in exciting form, but the Rugby Super League grand final may have taken the cake! The Super League, not to be confused with the European rugby league competition, is a semipro competition that is the top domestic level of rugby union in the United States. Tonight's grand final at Infinity Park in Glendale, Colorado, was a wild one.

New York Athletic Club had 2007 champs Belmont Shore on the run 17-6 at one point in the first half and 25-11 midway through the second, but Shore battled back to tie the score at 25 all with a converted try at the death. In the two ten-minute extra time periods, it was NYAC's turn to pull a comeback, as a penalty at the end of extra time leveled the scores again at 28. It had to end at some point, and in the sudden-death extra period NYAC hit a long penalty goal to win it. What a match.

Fortunately, it was televised live on ESPN Classic and also shown online on the USA Rugby Network. If you missed it, you should be able to catch the replay online on the USA Rugby Network or Infinity Park's streaming video service soon. If you've never watched a U.S. domestic match, this one will be worth your time.

If you want to see more television and Internet access to rugby union in the United States, you ought to be sure to watch. It shows show your interest to broadcasters and advertisers and increases the chance that there will be more to see in the future.

A Lesson in Discipline

For the average casual player, the big lesson from the 2008 Super 14 grand final might not be the final scoreline (20-12 to the Crusaders in a great match!), but the outcome of an ordinary decision by Brad Thorn. Leading 14-12 near the midpoint of the second half, the Crusaders seemed to have picked up a long try, but referee Mark Lawrence took it away and penalized Thorn for punching. Not only did the Crusaders lose the try and a lot of territory, but Thorn earned a yellow card.

Fortunately for Thorn, it didnt cost his side the match, but Thorn's gaffe gives every coach an opportunity to remind players that a loss of discipline could cost a side dearly. If a seasoned player like Thorn, who has been an international player in both rugby union and rugby league, can cost his side a try so easily, then any player needs to remember to stay cool in a physical sport.

A few other notes from the grand final:

• Anyone else wondering how she might have gone had Kurtley Beale not left with an injury?
• Waratahs center Rob Horne had a couple of beautiful one-touch passes that should remind any coach to train players in the skill.
• Surely this match is a testament that the Experimental Law Variations have added to the excitement without wrecking the significance of the scrum and line-out nor the contest for possession at the breakdown.
• Dan Carter's drop goal with about ten minutes to go must have had the Kiwi fans thinking about what might have been had Carter made it through the All Blacks' 2007 Rugby World Cup quarterfinal.
• In hindsight, given that the Crusaders' home ground features both fireworks and horses for the mascot knights to ride, it seems that the loose horse running wild on the ground after the match was an accident waiting to happen. Fortunately, no one appears to have been hurt.
• Australians and New South Welshmen must be wrestling with mixed feelings as the Crusaders hoist Robbie Deans up onto their shoulders. NSW, representing Australia in the final, has lost the match, but the mastermind of the victory is headed across the Tasman to Australia as the first foreign Wallabies coach. Interesting to say the least. Hopefully Deans is more optimistic about the Wallabies now than he was before the knockout rounds of the World Cup last year!

Turner Keeping Tahs in It

It's halftime of the 2008 Super 14 grand final, and an individual effort from the 2007Super 14 Rookie of the Year, Lachlan Turner is keeping the New South Wales Waratahs ahead by a fingernail 12-11 with two tries (albeit with some help from great team play) despite the Canterbury Crusaders' territorial dominance. Regardless of the final outcome, it might be safe to say that Turner has the Crusaders' number. After all, he scorched Canterbury with a famous individual try during a terrific performance in their 2007 match. Given all the All Blacks in the Crusaders' side, one wonders whether his performances against them might be enough to get him a debut Wallaby jumper. See below for a few highlights from that one a year back:

Super 14 Secret Weapon?

The Super 14 grand final is just hours away. Some say the New South Wales Waratahs can pull it off. More say it will go the Canterbury Crusaders' way. But the Crusaders forgot one thing New South Wales has that no one else does: Tah Man.


To be fair, the Crusaders' mascot knights aren't bad:

Sailing Back?

It may have been easy to forget about Wendell Sailor given more recent drug scandals, but the code-hopping, state hopping winger is back in action. The itinerant Torres Strait Islander from Queensland, who moved from rugby league and the Brisbane Broncos to rugby union and the Queensland Reds in 2001, then on to the rival New South Wales Waratahs in 2005, was kicked out of rugby union for two years after testing positive for cocaine in 2006. Australian Rugby League honored the ban, so Sailor was out of both codes until this year. Sailor tried everything, included the strange argument that he shouldn't be banned because he had not done any cocaine near enough to a match to affect his performance, but it was all for naught. By the end of the year, poor Wendell wasn't even welcome at a beach footy tournament.

He's on the comeback trail now, though. Swapping codes once more, Sailor has signed with the St. George Illawarra Dragons and is currently playing for the second-tier Jim Beam Cup side Shellharbour Marlins. After scoring a pair of tries in his debut with the Marlins, he says he's "still got it." What's more, he passed a drug test on his return to boot. Unfortunately, it looks like not everyone was impressed. Here's an amateur video clip from his comeback match featuring some drunken hecklers (warning: lots and lots of profanity in the audio):


To get that out of your mind, here's a clip of Sailor during better days:


And finally, if you were curious what Sailor was up to during the ban, here's a brief clip of him boxing for charity:

NSW Hears the Footsteps of Lockyer

Yesterday, we mentioned that Darren Lockyer's return to the Brisbane Broncos could bode well for Queensland in the 2008 State of Origin series. Now that Lockyer has put in a magic performance for Brisbane by setting up the match-winner against the Parramatta Eels, one has to wonder if we might see more of his heroics in the Origin over the next few weeks. He's certainly had a few over recent years in the #6 shirt for the Maroons, as the below video shows (though it's a bit grainy) at around 2:45-2:50, 4:28-4:32, 5:40-5:45, 6:07-6:10, and 7:20-7:30:

Super 14 Semifinal Highlights

As the Super 14 grand final looms, have a look at these highlights from last week's semifinal matches (Crusaders v. Hurricanes and Waratahs v. Sharks), courtesy of the Welsh Rugby Network:


While we're at it, splendid video clip site RugbyDump has provided highlights from last weekend's Heineken Cup and European Challenge Cup grand finals:

State of Origin: Locky the Legend Returns?

The Queensland Maroons are heading into the second match of the State of Origin series on the heels of an 18-10 loss to New South Wales, but things may be changing with news that legendary rugby league five-eighth Darren Lockyer may be back in action. Lockyer has struggled with injury since last year, when he missed a few matches early in the season, then missed the end of the season and the next several months with an anterior cruciate ligament rupture.

Lockyer's return to the Brisbane Broncos this week may bode well for Queensland's Origin chances in the second match 11 June, though the word is that he's not coming back just to boost the Origin side.

Lockyer's possible return, along with the less positive news that New South Wales stalwart midfielder Mark Gasnier is injured, may throw a few wrinkles in the always-exciting series.

Below is an interview clip with the soft-spoken playmaker from just before the start of the 2008 NRL season.

Grand Final Fever, U.S. Edition

A few days ago, Armchair Playmaker was raving about the deluge of rugby union grand finals that are washing over us at the moment. Although we were referring to prominent fully professional competitions then, we'd be remiss if we didn't also mention that it's a big weekend for finals in a number of United States competitions as well:

In the semi-professional Super League, the highest level of domestic rugby union in the United States (and yes, we are aware of the confusion caused by giving a rugby union comp in the United States essentially the same name as the top European rugby league competition), 2007 champions Belmont Shore will take on New York Athletic Club on Saturday at Infinity Park (the only dedicated municipal rugby stadium in the United States) in a grand final match in Glendale, CO.

The senior men's Division I and II semifinals will also be held Saturday at Infinity Park, followed by grand finals on Sunday. In the first division, the Glendale (CO) Raptors get to play (on their home ground, no less) against the Pearl City (Muscatine, IA) Black Bears, while Olympic Club (San Franciso, CA) takes on Life University (Marietta, GA). The second division semifinals pit Brandywine (Philadelphia, PA area) against Detroit (MI) and Wisconsin (Madison, WI) against Red Mountain (Phoenix, AZ area). In addition to the Sunday grand finals, both competitions will have a consolation final Sunday as well.

Infinity Park will also host the senior Men's Division III grand final Sunday between Reno (NV) and Michiana (South Bend, IN area).

While all of that action is taking place in Colorado, Pittsburgh, PA will be the site of the boy's high school and boy's and girl's U-19 national tournaments from Friday to Sunday. Each of these events will feature eight entrants from across the nation, and quarterfinals, semifinals, and a grand final will be played along with consolation bracket matches ensuring that every side plays three matches on the weekend. In case you're wondering what separates the boy's high school and boy's U-19 tournaments, the former is for sides from only one school and the latter is for sides representing more than one school. A club can only compete in one competition, though the distinction is murky as a one-school side can slide into the U-19 comp by adding a token player from outside of the school.

In case you missed the collegiate championships earlier this month, you can still watch full-match video online free of charge on the USA Rugby Network. Featured matches include the men's and women's Division I semifinals and finals and the men's and women's Division II grand finals.

Tohs, We Hardly Knew Ye

Just about a week ago, Armchair Playmaker was fretting about whether the South Sydney Rabbitohs' troubles might cruel their chances for a return visit to the United States next year. At this point, it looks like there's as much chance of the Rabbitohs playing a match on the moon as there is of them returning for another exhibition in the States. Along with other woes, woes, and more woes comes Souths coach Jason Taylor's pronouncement that their preseason Florida trip got them "put a big dent in our season" and got them "on the back foot" for the year. No word on whether Rabbitohs second-rower David Fa'alogo is disappointed that he probably won't have another opportunity to meet and greet Floridians in his own special way.

Well, it was fun while it lasted. For what it's worth, Armchair Playmaker still appreciates the Tohs' effort to bring the NRL to the States in 2008, especially the tireless labor of Peter Holmes a Court on the trip.

Grand Final Fever!

Rugby union lovers are smack in the middle of a swarm of finals and loving it. This past Saturday saw Munster strangle/bore Toulouse to death for a 16-13 Heineken Cup grand final win while Bath muscled past Worcester 26-14 in the European Challenge Cup grand final. This Saturday has just as much on offer, with frequent Super 14 champs Canterbury Crusaders hosting the New South Wales Waratahs in the Super 14 grand final a few hours before Leicester makes their essentially annual appearance in the Guinness Premiership grand final against the London Wasps.

That ought to be enough to keep a fan busy!

Unraveling the Mystery of the European Rugby Union Comps

This weekend is a big one for rugby union in Europe. The Heineken Cup (H-Cup in France due to restrictions on alcool advertising) has its grand final between Munster and Toulouse. Next weekend, the Guinness Premiership has its grand final as well, between London Wasps and Leicester Tigers. Last year, Leicester was in both.

To the dedicated European Rugby Union fan, this is old news. To a more casual observer, though, the question might be: What are all of these comps, and why are the same sides in them? For that casual observer, we offer a run-down of the labyrinthine structure of the European rugby union competitions. Get comfortable. This is going to take a while.

Okay, let's start with the top domestic comps:

The Guinness Premiership (henceforth GP) is the top professional competition in England. It features 12 sides, all English. In the past, it's been known by other names due to sponsorship, such as the Zurich Premiership. The side that claims the wooden spoon in this competition is relegated to play in the lower National Division One competition the following year, while the National Division One champ is promoted to the GP. Incidentally, the National Division One is made up of professional and semi-professional sides, and the next levels are National Division Two and National Division Three (the latter of which is divided into North and South).

In France, the top professional domestic competition is the aptly named Top 14. If you need further explanation as to how many sides compete in it, you would make a great rugby league prop forward. The bottom two sides in this comp each year slide down to Rugby Pro D2, who sends its top two sides up to the Top 14. Both of these levels of competition are managed by Ligue Nationale de Rugby, which translates to "National Rugby League," a name that might remind some of the shameful history of the French Rugby Federation's collaboration with the Vichy regime to wipe out rugby league in France.

But we digress. Anyway, Ireland (both the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland), Scotland, and Wales all compete together in their top professional competition, the Magners League, so it's more of a quasi-domestic competition. There are currently ten sides in the Magners League: Four Irish (including Northern Ireland), Four Welsh, and two Scottish. Because the sides in this competition are regional and provincial sides, there is no promotion or relegation system (though sides are occasionally eliminated by restructuring implemented by their overseeing unions). Not too long ago, it was called the Celtic League.

In Italy, the Super 10 is the top rugby union level. There does not appear to be a standard system of promotion and relegation with the next level, the 12-team Serie A.

If you got all that, then it's time to share the multinational competitions that sides rom more than one of these comps play in:

The Heineken Cup/H-Cup features 24 sides from the above domestic competitions (based on the previous year's results), which are arranged into six pools of four who play six pool matchs plus quarterfinal, semifinal, and final knockout rounds. The GP and Top 14 each put their top six sides in it, and the top three Irish, top three Welsh, and top two Scottish sides from the Magners League go in as well. One more entrant comes from France, England or Italy (whichever of the three nations produced the top finisher among them the previous year), and the last is from a play-in round between the top Super 10 and Magners League sides who have not already qualified. At this point, you may want to rest up before reading further.

The European Challenge Cup is the next level of pan-European competition. It's essentially a second-tier Heineken Cup. All of the sides from the GP, Magners League, and Top 14 that don't make it to the Heineken Cup go into the European Challenge Cup, as do four clubs from the Super 10 that didn't make the Heineken Cup. Then, just to mix things up, they chuck in a Romanian side, Bucureşti, which is formed specially for the European Challenge Cup. Five pools of four sides each are formed and each side plays six pool matches to determine who makes the quarterfinal knockout rounds, which are followed by semis and the final. Oh, and among its previous names is the Parker Pen Cup.

Ok, we're almost done. The EDF Energy Cup involves only the 12 GP sides and the four Welsh teams from the Magners League, which is why it's also called the Anglo-Welsh Cup. Not long ago, it was the Powergen Cup. Four pools of four sides each (three English, one Welsh) are formed, each side plays three pool matches, and each pool winner makes the semifinals to see who moves on to the final.

So there you have it. A lot of clubs from a fair few nations playing ina lot of competitions. The last source of occasional confusion comes from the timing of the comps. They all overlap wildly. In 2007-2008, for example, the Heineken Cup started pool matches in November (not counting the play-in round in May) and will end this weekend. The European Challenge Cup runs a similar schedule, which started last November and ends 25 May with a Bath v. Worcester final. The EDF Energy Cup began last October and ended in April (the Neath-Swansea Ospreys beat Leicester in the final) The GP started last September and will end next weekend, and the Magners League started at the end of August and ended on 10 May (Leinster won it based on table results as there are no knockout matches).

The Top 14 started in October and will end in June, and the Super 10 started in October and will end this weekend. This year was a little out of the ordinary due to the World Cup, but you get the idea.

If you can keep all of that sorted, you're up on rugby union in Europe. If you can't, I don't think you're alone.

Mixed Feelings for Broncos

The Brisbane Broncos, long a major contributor to Queensland's State of Origin side, must have had mixed feelings. On the one hand, Queensland went down to New South Wales 18-10 in the first match of the 2008 State of Origin series. On the other hand, Broncos halfback Peter Wallace had a blinder for NSW in his Origin debut. The Broncos are used to having to lose a few good men to the mid-season series, but it can't be easy to have one playing so well against Queensland!

Origin I 2007 Flashback

With 15 hours or so left until the start of 2008 State of Origin series, Armchair Playmaker is excited. For those not familiar with the mid-season rugby league series, it's a best-of-three representative competition between Australia's New South Wales and Queensland states, with players' eligibility determined by the state in which they played their first senior rugby league rather than by where they play now. To get some idea of the intensity of the competition, consider that last year, Queensland's Dallas Johnson was knocked unconscious in the first minute, only to return to the field in the second half. (A great moment for sporting lore; not so much for sports medicine.)

As the first game of this year's series draws near, here's a look at the highlights of last year's edition. NSW Debutant Jarryd Hayne took a turn as both the hero and the goat, scoring a great individual try on the stroke of half time and then gifting one to the opposition with a brain explosion in the 61st minute. Easy come, easy go.

"Freakish" Try in RL Centenary Test

This one's a couple of weeks old now, but worth seeing. You don't have to be able to fly to play rugby league, but as Greg Inglis shows in the Centenary Test between Australia and New Zealand, it sure helps.

You can surely see why the AFL was interested in him.

Super 14 Round 14 Recap

The round-robin stages of the 2008 Super 14 competition ended last weekend, and it was a thriller to the end with three semifinal spots decided in the final round. Below are highlights from all seven matches of that final round.

This weekend, the top-seeded Crusaders will host the Hurricanes in Canterbury, while the Waratahs will host the Sharks in Sydney. If you are in the United States and have (or can switch to) DirecTV or DISH Network, you can watch them (and a lot of other rugby union and rugby league matches) by subscribing to Setanta Sports for 14.99 USD a month. If that's not an option, you may want to consider purchasing the matches from The Rugby Channel for 5 USD a match (package deals also available). Note that Setanta's broadand service doesn't include the Super 14 comp, even though it's on their television schedule.

Big Willie: What's Not to Love?!

Last post, we mentioned a video from Jed Thian's Alternative Rugby Commentary site. While we're at it, we may as well mention the ARC's jab at Big Willie Mason. Seems that the ARC has had a little bit of an uncharacteristic rugby league focus lately, and while their videos can be a little bit cruel toward well, anything but the New Zealand rugby union sides, who doesn't enjoy a little bit of teasing directed toward Big Willie?

Pwease Come Back, Wusty's Wabbits!

Armchair Playmaker was very glad that co-owners Russell Crowe and Peter Holmes a Court brought the South Sydney Rabbitohs to the United States this January for a training camp and a well-attended exhibition match against the 2007 Engage Super League champions Leeds Rhinos. Back then, though, the Rabbitohs had just come off an appearance in the 2007 NRL finals (finishing seventh) and were talking of better things to come.

Now that the Rabbitohs are propping up the table so far in the 2008 season, though, will they cut out the lavish intercontinental trips? News that co-owner Peter Holmes a Court, who was everywhere doing the hard labor during the Florida trip, is stepping down from the club's executive director position, is not a good omen. Considering that Armchair Playmaker is based in the States, we sure hope they come back, though. Come back to the U.S. in 2009, Rabbitohs!

(By the way: The "Wusty's Wabbits" bit is courtesy of Jed Thian and the Alternative Rugby Commentary site, which recently released a good-natured (hopefully) poke at the NRL:

Global ELVs Trial: Whither the Lower-Level Refs?

Armchair Playmaker is a big fan of the Experimental Law Variations that rugby union has been exploring for the last few years, so we're generally happy to see that 13 of them will be used in a one-year global trial from 1 August 2008. In general, the ELVs are meant to make the game quicker and easier to understand for players, referees, and supporters alike. For more on the ELVs and their application, see the guide released by the International Rugby Board.

Some detractors, such as 2007 IRB player of the year Bryan Habana, claim that the ELVs will make rugby union more like rugby league. If he means that we'll actually start seeing some tries, perhaps he's right.

In any case, the ELVs will surely get interesting when they hit the lower levels. In Armchair Playmaker's homeland of the United States, for example, there are over 76,000 registered members of USA Rugby. A lot of those members are players refereed by part-timers making 50 USD or so to referee a match. A lot of them rely on general memories from their playing days for most of their laws know-how, leading to more than a few errors on the finer points of advantage, when to award a 22-meter dropout vs. a 5-meter scrum, how crooked a lineout throw has to be to merit a sanction, when to award a free kick instead of a penalty, etc., etc. How will they handle the ELVs?

Armchair Playmaker says full speed ahead. If a lot of lower-level referees are getting things wrong already, then maybe a major law overhaul will force them to learn not just the ELVs, but those laws they should already know. And if not, then they'll just get the new laws wrong just as they did the old ones. If the ELVs make the sport more exciting, then more interest = more new referees. Maybe they'll be more studious than some of the old ones!

What do you think? Comment below and share your thoughts on the ELVs and how you think they'll be handled by referees, etc.