We hav the same phrase in Ireland, but add an extra line:
Gaelic football is a game for louts, played by louts. 
I must start by saying I hate sport.
BUT NZ rugby (union) is the game of the nation. Upper class, lower class or any other class. Rugby is IT. The All Blacks are IT (I have even watched them myself…sometimes you have to or you may be banished from the land 
) Rugby Union is THE biggest sport here.
Rugby league is now very popular to watch because we have a team in the Aussie league (a team now doing shit) but it is traditionaly a ‘game of the working class’.
Soccer is something kids play. Though when it comes to national teams the ‘Socceroos’ beat the ‘All Whites’ often.
I believe the ‘Socceroos’ deserve the win because of their horribbly embarassing name.
So very very true. Australia are about 50 places higher in the Fifa rankings - just behind Uzbekistan and Kuwait. New Zealand scrape into the top 100, bewteen Lithuania and Georgia. Aw, bless 
Like we care! We play rugby!
Maori beat the Lions for a very good start to the tour. Sad, sad Lions.
(ok I know nothing…I saw the the last 10 minutes of the Maori game but we give NOT a shit about the soccer and we have a way better name then “Socceroos”) )
Is “rugger” slang for “rugby football”?
more for rugby Union I would say.
I have never ever heard the term “rugger” used in real life, only on tv by some snobbish plummy public school type. No working class person would ever use the word rugger.
In Australia “rugger” is Union, not League. “Rugger buggers” play/watch Rugby Union (as well as everything else that private-school types do).
Incidentally, there’s a capitalisation issue here. “Rugby”, “Union” and “League” really ought to be capitalised because they are parts of the names of organisations. But you don’t need to capitalise “rugger” or “soccer”, even though they are derived from the names of the Rugby Union and the Football Association. (And in the even more distant past, “Rugby” comes from the name of Rugby School.)
I agree, capitalisation is required when referring to the proper names of the organisations called the Rugby Union and the Rugby League, but if you’re just referring to the game called “rugby,” it doesn’t make any sense to capitalise it, no more than saying one must capitalise “baseball” in “I’m a baseball fan” just because it is part of the name “Major League Baseball.”
Furthermore, it seems to me that if you’re referring to versions of the game rugby, it makes sense to downcase them as “league rugby” and “union rugby,” unless you’re specifically referring to organisations with the proper names “Rugby Union” and “Rugby League.”
Oh I understand what he was saying. But in my mind there is nothing like rugby union (my opinion). Thus, to compare the two codes, again in my opinion, is outrageous.
I will say this though, some of the hits I’ve seen in league, are brutal. I mean BRUTAL!!
The brutal looking hits in league generally knock the wind out a bit, perhpas the odd bruise around the ribcage.
They don’t usually present the nasty career ending injuries, the ones that do are the spinning half crunches which throw the pursued player offline and off balance, without breaking momentum and stright into the path of some other backup plyer who is moving faster but arriving a bit later.
You get players being hit without being properly braced for the dirction of impact and knee and ankle injuries.
You don’t need particularly huge hits or dramatic crunches when that happens.
The reason hits are so hard in league is that there is the prospect of stopping the momentum of attack, and the possibility of a possession turnover at every tackle, either by tackle count down or just slamming so hard that last gasp passess go astray or the ball gets forced out.
In Union, the tackle is just the beginning of the story, the player being tackled is looking for backup and either goes down into a ruck or turns around for a maul, the tackller has the problem that he can’t commit himself like the League player can, the Union player has the problem of keeping onside, and being available for the follow up play.
When you see the Rugby Sevens, where League teams are invited for part of the show, there are no mauls or rucks, scrums are very limited, tackling falls squarely into the remit of the League player, dead stops one on one and big hits.
The Union player simply does not train the upper body in the same way, I’v trained with League pros, and they concentrate massively on the the chest area, not just the pecs, but also those that pull the arms downwards and across, as I say, they tend to end up barrel chested as a result.
It does mean they have huge clamping power, either to hang on to the ball during those huge hits, or to hang on to the opponents they tackle.
Unions skills and requirements have similarities, power and endurance, but in certain aspects, tackling especially there is a marked differance.
Union wingers are immensely fast, faster than league(except perhaps for Martin Offiah in his heyday) but are more easily brought down, League players have to be able to do a bit of everything, from ball carrying to passing to tackling, but they are not quite as specialised in certain areas.
The one injury maker I see with Union that does make me wince, is when Union players go up in lineouts to catch and get hit whilst extended, League players do take hits when taking high balls but not in the same way >ouch<
It’s also popular in the north west; Wigan, St Helens, Widnes, Warrington etc. We only have one decent union team here, Sale.
Sorry, yes, ‘north-east’ was a typo. :smack: