Never has so much happened in an NRL season that this year - well from my experience anyway.
What has happened? Quite a few things actually:
Salary cap taking its toll on players, with the big news of Sonny Bill Williams leaving his 4 or 5 year deal with the dogs. Off to France to play Union. More and more of league players are finding the big bucks attractive overseas, i.e. England and now France. I was on the Daily Telegraph today and read of Souths' Dean Withers going overseas too. Then there was the news of Gasnier leaving a while ago. And even the douche Paul Gallen commented that he would leave league for bigger money - way to make yourself a bigger douche mate - ruined Origin, might as well ruin your reputation as a player also, douche.
Solution?
Get rid of the damn salary cap - why does league need it? Soccer, Union, NFL, Basketball - all successful, profitable sports that I do believe do NOT have salary caps - sure teams would suffer in terms of the rich vs the poor - but so what - it will keep players in the game = a better game to watch = happier audience all around - why can't David Gallop see this?
Grapple tackles.
Although very alarming and dangerous to a player - grapples have somewhat been reduced after referees and players complaining about them, naming the Melbourne Storm as the main culprits. But as I read through the Daily Telegraph site, Melbourne are not the only ones. In fact, there is a
list that shows the team that grapples the most. Souths were second with 19 offences with West Tigers being the first. Melbourne were ranked 4th. Ironic how Jason Taylor was having a sook about the way grapple tackling was being used, especially against his own men, when his damn team are one of the main offenders.
Misbehaving Players:
It's becoming more common seeing misbehaving NRL players being mentioned on the news, with the most recent Todd Carney urinating on some dude's head - nice. This issue doesn't really phase me however - sports people are people too - and what Todd did was pretty funny.
Footballers turn boxers?
Mason almost did, having a few fights lined up, but never actually happened. Anthony Mundine has started a fad - even though he switched to boxing ages ago - I read that he won again - can someone please beat him?
Souths not last.
Self explanatory - and I'm amazed just how good Craig Wing actually is - I think since he's come back he has scored a try in each game - Riley Brown needs to damage his other shoulder.
QLD winning Origin again.. not expanding on that.
There are probably more issues I haven't noted, these are the ones that are lingering in my head, feel free to comment on the ones that I missed.