If Sam Tomkins wants to play in the National Rugby League he will need to learn how to do one simple thing.
Shut the fuck up!
Sam Tomkins has a weekly article he writes for the UK’s Mail Online. It is actually a pretty good read if only for the fact that he doesn’t hold back. It is not like most articles you read from football players that are boring. Tomkins normally has something to say and he is not afriad to say it.
Still, there comes a point in life when you need your brain to kick in and throw up the filters. That is what I thought when I read this paragraph in his Mail Online article titled It’ll be a different challenge but Wigan want repeat of Hull KR thrashing and England can match Aussies and Kiwis at World Cup.
When talking about the World Cup and Englands chances, Tomkins said:
“If I could write the script to my own fairy tale I’d want to beat the Aussies in the semis and New Zealand in the final. I don’t want to give the Kangaroos the opportunity to play in the final. It would be unbelievable if we could knock them out in front of a packed house at Wembley. I’d take great pleasure sending them home without silverware.”
Great! No doubt that will get some of the Pommy knuckle draggers beating their chests about being confident. The problem is, its dumb.
You never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever give the Australian Kangaroo’s any reason to every get pissed off and fired up about ANYTHING.
This is a lesson the New Zealand side took a long time to learn. The final lesson they received came after then NZRL Chairman Andrew Chalmers claimed the 2007 Kangaroo’s team looked “vulnerable”. That prompted the Kangaroo’s to go out and beat New Zealand by a record scoreline of 58-0 in Wellington a few days later. Since that record loss, the Kiwi’s have done nothing but praise Australia. Even as they held the World Cup trophy aloft, the Kiwi’s would still go into tests against Australia saying nothing that could be used as motivation.
This is something Sam Tomkins needs to learn. Especially if he wants to play in the NRL.
You see, its all well and good for Sam to run his mouth off in Super League. He can go out there and feel like a super star when playing against Wakefield, Salford or Hull KR and then play make believe that he is worth $1,000,000 per season to an NRL club. The thing is, if he is going to run his mouth like that, he is going to get physically and mentally destroyed in the NRL.
You look at Adrian Morley, Gareth Ellis, Sam Burgess, James Graham….none of them talk trash about Australia. These are players that have all achieved far more against better opposition than Sam Tomkins has.
Any player that has played in Australia knows you don’t cross that line. You do not under any circumstances give the opposition a reason to fire up. If you do say something, you’d better be able to back it up!
That is Sam Tomkins problem. For all of his trash talking about Australia at international level, he has never even come close to backing it up.
Sam can sit there in England and claim he will be playing behind the best forwards all he likes. He can talk about how close he thinks England are to Australia and New Zealand all day long. When it comes down to it, he will need to back it up on the field of play. Anyone that knows anything about Rugby League knows that in those moments that an Englishman is asked to prove himself in the face of the mighty Australian Kangaroo’s….he will wilt under the pressure. He will be nothing more than a backdrop to a performance that only a great Rugby League team full of truly great Rugby League players can ever imagine putting on.
Sam Tomkins might want to send Australia back home without any silverware, but what do you think Australia want to now do to Sam Tomkins in front of a packed Wembley Stadium, in front of his own countrymen and with his own reputation on the line?
Good luck with that Sam!
Tomkins is a great player but he’s talking ALOT. I know its his role but I dont even think the Poms are the second best team in the game let alone the best. They’ll be flat chat beating the Kiwis to get to the final let alone beating the Kangas.
In the dair dinkum stakes Australia are 15 heads above the rest and only a one off game ala the last World Cup final can lead to anything different
He does say if he wrote the script to his own fairy tale he’d like this to happen. Perhaps you shouldn’t take it to seriously