Fuck Rugby?

On the face of it: A rough sport that rewards perseverance and commitment.

What society has made it: An exclusive sport thats kids are sent to mummy an daddy schools to grow up in, learn contacts, develop posh accents and ways of thinking and pour scorn on everyone else.

Rugby (if you believe the press) has become so popular in Ireland the last few years, the odd Ireland match I do like but apart from that I dont care, it gets so much coverage though.

I just hate the posh boy * that comes with it and like it or not rugby is related to all sorts of racism and classicism from the get go, even though I know you could point me towards tons of right wing football groups I dont think I could be pointed to even 2 left wing rugby fan groups.

I basically think the associations could do alot more to eradicate the bad things.

End of the day who wants to identify and agree with Cormac from Ailesbury road who sounds more English than he does Irish about these issues.

 

Agree. Had to play at High Skool. No football team FFS tried to be toffs etc..

 

Went to a posh school and used to play 2- 3 times a week.

Some of the guys who played ,especially at club level , were * to be fair. Dont know about right wing and racist tho.

 

I think it depends where you come from.
Certainly in England, the pink champagne & camping baskets emerging from the boots of cars at the ‘Twickers’ car park is a testament to that. And as The Jams Eton Rifles attests to, it is an upper (pervieved) class sport, but in Wales it is definitely a working mans thing. Historically, the entire Welsh team over the decades has emerged from just a couple of mining valleys in the South of the country, how they continue to produce a conveyor belt of such talent is a mystery. It was a case of down the pit Monday - Friday, Rugby on Saturday & Chapel on Sunday. Add to that Phil Bennett’s famous pre-match speech “Look at what these posh * have done to Wales. They’ve taken our coal, our water & our steel. They buy our houses and live in them for a fortnight every 12 months & what have they given us? Absolutely nothing. We’ve been exploited, raped, controlled and punished by the English - and youre playing them this afternoon”.
Don’t know enough about it in Ireland or Scotland though. I played it in all my school years for the school team & fell in love with it.

 

Completely disagree. Great sport that teaches respect and discipline. You only have to look at the way players of all ability levels treat the referee to see the difference between it and football. Add to that the fact that rugby players hammer each other for 80 minutes before going off for a beer together and it’s one of the best sports out there. Same goes for the way fans can mingle.

I’ve also got no idea where you’ve got this idea of racism and rugby from. Any ‘right wing’ rugby fans you’d get would most likely just be small ‘c’ Conservatives who believe in the free market.

 

Rugby Union aye ? Rugby League certainly isn't elitist

 

This is true.

 

The media in Ireland have done their best to push the rugby agenda for years. Rugby is given preference as the number one sport where Gaelic Games is relegated to 3rd behind rugby and soccer. Our national anthem isn't good enough for these *.

Guy in a shop recently looking for geen and white bunting. When told there was loads of tricolour bunting(st patricks day coming so loads of Irish stuff in the shop) he replied "I need green and white it's for the rugby". Hun *

 

Gaelic Games will always be number 1.

 

Fukin hate the game..and the people who follow it.
If I was to stereotype anything or anyone it would be a Rugby Buftie.

When I was at high school we were forced to play the stupid game..no football.

70% of the kids hated it and would take football any day of the week but not our school ...*.

It's worse when they are all grouped together in a pub playing their drinking games with their planer clothes ...remember being in a pub with my mate one time when some rugby club came in..
They had one of those blow up seats and it kept bumping my mate who got so effed off with them he causally stubbed his roll up out on it.

Don't usually rant on here but I despise the ##### all the way.

 

Great sport, especially seeing how the Irish team are doing as well at it at present and we produced some top players which we should be very proud of. Besides the national anthem * I don't see much wrong with it, there's always an amazing atmosphere. And like has been mentioned before I like how there's respect for the referees, all the players actually act like men and they all shake hands afterwards no matter what. Would of course like to see more opportunities for young lads to play it being made available though, I don't think it's as elitist in Ireland as it is in the UK though as there's certainly plenty of working class lads I know who play it for their clubs.

 

I can't deny that there's a sense of elitism that surrounds rugby union, in Scotland at least. My school had a rugby team but I'm sure it was started by a bunch of lads who just didn't like football. It's probably more accessible than it used to be and I remember rugby Scotland giving free tickets to my school, for Scotland matches and that's how I first got an interest in the sport. I remember 13-year-old me being absolutely stunned that there were away fans sitting mixed in with the home fans.

I have a passing interest in international matches, but other than that, I don't follow it much. In football, I find the pricing out of the working man, far more disturbing.

 

I used to hate it, now I dont mind it. Purely as a sport I just dont enjoy it as much as football but I have learned to at least tolerate it.

I get there is still a public schoolboy culture around rugby but there is a lot about it I respect compared to football.

Firstly, I respect the players more. I appreciate their attitude more than footballers and the game has been ruined by money yet. There is a degree of 'fair play' that exists in rugby that doesnt exist in football.

Similarly, gate prices at a club level are decent and fans arent fleeced. Even the bigger rugby clubs connect to the local community far more than big football clubs. And of course fans are treated like adults in that they can drink and mix in the stadium.

As @Minty says, the bigger worry is the extent to which the working class fan is being priced out of watching football. Even worse, the extent to which poorer kids are being priced out from even playing which is terrible given the roots of the game. No point moaning about public school boys playing rugby when more and more kids are being priced out of football.

 

Find it just as boring as cricket. Have absolutely zero interest in it.

 

Is this a private school thing then? The lads I play with up here are mainly just normal folk from the Borders.

 

Gay as *. I don't get the appeal of watching a gang of men roll around in the dirt with each other for almost an hour and a half.

 

I went to a rugby-playing school; everyone was brand new. Then again, I have met a couple of ‘rugby boys’ at uni, and they are the most insufferable arseholes about.

I think that CymruBhoy made a good point: it varies from area to area, and individual to individual. There can be an elitist element, but it is far from universal.

Celtic and Racing 92 fans share a pub in Paris (most follow the other as well), and they are all down-to-earth and mostly leftist.

I would much rather watch Scotland play rugby than football, and it is not even close for me. I follow Glasgow Warriors as well.

 

Egg chasing *.

 

Most rugby-playing schools in Scotland are independent schools (schools in the Borders might be the exception to that).

I went to two of them; I loved one of the schools and hated the other (which was full of stuck-up arseholes), so it is a mixed bag.

 

In Fife and Edinburgh anyway it is predominantly private schools. Growing up in Fife I have never played rugby in my life because we didnt have it at school and noone I knew played either. It was very much a game for rich kids in St Andrews.