Rugby!

So last weekend we went to watch the Canberra Raiders play the Newcastle Knights in National Rugby League action.

I've watched a fair bit of rugby league on TV, but this is the first game I've been to in person. A few observations...

For people raised on American football ("gridiron" in the local lingo), rugby league games go FAST. There are relatively few interruptions. The guy gets tackled, after flopping about a little to get the other guys off of him (if they stay on too long they get penalized, happened to the Knights several times) he stands up, rolls the ball under his foot to his team-mate, and play continues. In play, with the hitting and tackling and the shape of the ball, it more resembles American football. But in pace, it is closer to soccer.

Stadium food in Canberra was actually cheap and decent. I had a good and large roast beef and grilled onion on a tasty roll sandwich that ran me about US$7. Coffee (the usual high-quality espresso based coffee) was about US$2.80, roughly the standard cost for a good cup of coffee in Canberra. A beer was only US$4! I'm used to American stadiums really jacking up the prices.

The fans were like fans everywhere - yelling at the officials to call more fouls, complaining when a Raider made a mistake, the occasional obscenity wafting out across the scene. Though the fans left in a pretty good mood - the Raiders thrashed the Knights 38-18 (two late Newcastle scores made the game look closer than it was), winning their fifth game out of the last six.

But I'm sorry, the Raiders' cheergirls (as they call cheerleaders) were lame. The outfits were suitably skimpy (made me cold watching them on a day when it was about 50 fahrenheit/10 celsius) but they didn't do much. A little rah-rah routine at half time, but they actually sat on chairs during the game, occasionally waving their pom-poms. It seemed rather muted compared to American cheerleaders.

Oh - and definitely no MALE cheerleaders. We asked our Australian friend if there were male cheerleaders, and he looked as if we'd asked whether Australia had any space aliens in its government. By way of proving that there ARE male cheerleaders in the US, we mentioned that George W. Bush (pictured above) had been a male cheerleader in high school. Our Aussie friends laughed out loud. I don't think they were impressed by that factoid.