RUGBY LEAGUE is very fortunate that Ryan Hall, who played his 500th career game for Leeds at Headingley on Saturday, chose to play our sport as a youngster rather than any other.
In any competition to find the most academic Rugby League player, I’m sure Ryan would be a front runner.
He’s a great player and has been since his debut at the Magic Weekend in 2007.
But he’s also a uniquely interesting individual who, if he had gone for an alternative career, would probably have enrolled to study pure mathematics at university.
And of course he also has great skills as a pianist and he’s an expert at solving Rubik’s Cubes, among his other talents.
Last week, prior to his 500th appearance, he had a press conference with the Rugby League media and he made it clear that he has no intention of bringing his Rugby League career to an end this year.
He wants to carry on playing into next year, preferably with Leeds Rhinos, especially if the Rhinos are one of the Super League clubs invited to go to Las Vegas.
The Allegiant Stadium would be a great stage for Ryan and his team-mates and I’m sure plenty of Leeds supporters would make the trip to support their team.
It would be a tremendous prospect and it was great to see the Rhinos fans, as well as the Wigan supporters, applauding his achievement so generously at Headingley on Saturday.
This Friday the 5,000th game in the history of Super League will be played when Warrington entertain Leeds Rhinos at the Halliwell Jones Stadium.
It somehow seems appropriate that the player who has just completed 500 career games will be playing in that fixture.
The loyal Giant
LEROY CUDJOE’S achievement in playing his 400th career game for Huddersfield Giants at Salford Red Devils last Thursday has been somewhat overshadowed by Ryan Hall’s achievement and also by the Giants’ poor record so far this season.
But Leroy has been a wonderful one-club servant at the Giants and he deserves enormous respect for his achievements.
He made his Huddersfield debut in 2008, a year after Ryan Hall’s debut for Leeds, and he has never been anywhere else, which many people might think must have been a frustrating experience for him, given that the Giants have promised much in that time but delivered little.
It’s always tempting to wonder what a player might have achieved if he had moved to a club that won trophies more regularly, but in Leroy’s case we will never know the answer to that question.
But my admiration for him knows no bounds, especially after he recovered from a very serious knee injury a few years ago that had threatened to end his career.
His loyalty to Huddersfield is exemplary and, if there was any way of doing it, he should be given the freedom of the town.
An obstruction play
THERE has been some great rugby played so far this season.
It began right at the start, when Leigh registered that remarkable golden-point win in the first game of the season, and it has continued every week since.
There have been tight matches, shock results, wonderful tries, great events (with Las Vegas inevitably the biggest of all) and great crowds, with a series of Super League matches selling out this season in a way that hasn’t happened previously.
We should all be celebrating the good things that have been happening, while not ignoring some of the more difficult developments in the game.
In saying that, I’m obviously talking about Salford, but also about the current situation in Rugby League’s governing body.
It’s immensely frustrating to feel obliged to write about RFL directors when there is so much great rugby to watch and to celebrate.
Similarly it’s frustrating to have to reflect on the possibility that the NRL might want to buy a major stake in the British game when none of us really know what the NRL’s intentions might be.
No doubt we will have more to say on that issue when the NRL’s intentions become clearer.
But it is worth pointing out the remarkable decision by the directors who departed the RFL last week to nominate six other directors on their way out of the door, rather than allowing the incoming interim Chairman Nigel Wood and Chief Executive Tony Sutton to nominate board members.
I’m not sure what their motivation was, but it does have the effect of potentially blocking Nigel from achieving his objectives in his new role.
Surely they wouldn’t want to do that on purpose, thereby defying the clubs in membership of the RFL!
Wigan fans’ deep pockets
WIGAN fans will probably be incapable of being consoled, following their Challenge Cup defeat against Hull FC a week ago and their narrow defeat against Leeds Rhinos on Saturday.
In my view the key factor in those two defeats, looking at them solely from Wigan’s point of view, was the injury suffered by Jai Field against Hull that saw him leave the field early.
Jai is one of the best cover tacklers in the game and his absence in the second half allowed Hull to create three brilliant tries for their young winger Liam Martin, who looks to me like a future England international.
Wigan fans will obviously be disappointed to miss this season’s Challenge Cup Final.
But to look at the opposite side of the coin, I wonder how many of them would have made the journey to Wembley after having forked out an awful lot of money to follow their team to Las Vegas in such huge numbers.
A few of them may even have felt a slight tinge of relief at not having to dig deep into their pockets once again.
Looking back to that Challenge Cup game, at half-time the score was 22-6 in Wigan’s favour.
At that moment Betfred were offering odds of 100-1 on a Wigan victory, while Hull fans could have backed their team to win at odds of 25-1, making a cool packet while celebrating their victory.
I’m told, however, that no one took advantage of those odds.
