r/nrl • u/thankyoupancake Eastern Suburbs Roosters • 3d ago
Reed Mahoney is the current master, but does sledging or niggling opponents actually work?
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/nrl/the-art-of-gnaw-niggling-opponents-is-a-dark-art-but-does-it-work-20240628-p5jph1.html75
u/Large-Accident1245 Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
I mean it clearly worked against Newcastle.
Sledges/being annoying on the field have to be a) quality and b) targeted. Getting under their skin can be from a barrage of insults to tackling them from marker a few too many times for their liking. Sometimes, it doesn't work at all and hurts your side more. Other times, you become Michael Ennis and succeed.
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u/DinBizzz Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
Anyone who doesn’t think sledging happens on a regular basis on any sporting field has never played a sport in their life.
People quickly forgot how chirpy Newcastle were to Mahoney and the dogs last year when we got absolutely pumped by them twice, if you’re a professional rugby league player that can’t keep your emotions in check for the sake of your team you deserve to be sitting down.
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u/IIIIIIW New Zealand Warriors 3d ago
We had a halfback on our team that was absolutely hated by every team and it was super effective at indirectly forcing errors. It’s enjoyable when it’s your team but otherwise fuck Mahoney haha
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u/DinBizzz Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
You aren’t on that field to make friends, dogs have adopted a win at all cost mentality and I’m here for it.
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u/Mr_Mac Parramatta Eels 3d ago
Sledging and niggles are a part of every game. Every team needs a grub, most have one, and everyone needs to stop trying to take the pretend high ground on it.
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u/DinBizzz Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
It’s honestly half the fun, look at the origin games the other night (under 19’s and the game 2 on Wednesday) a lot of gamesmanship giving it to eachother and it made for great viewing
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u/shadyFS91 Parramatta Eels 3d ago
People also forget how much Reed cried last year against parra when he got absolutely rolled.
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u/iTackleFatKids Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
Remember how much gutho cried a few weeks ago
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u/shadyFS91 Parramatta Eels 3d ago
Except gutho doesn't have a reputation of a "niggler". Reed has a big mouth for a bloke who literally was balling his eyes out because big bad reg and junior bullied him in a game 😂
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u/iTackleFatKids Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
But gutho just whinges about everything that doesn’t matter. He was crying to the ref about losing the dogs game because an “obstruction” that was 20 meters away from the play. Ref had to basically tell him to shut the fuck up and get over it
Reed is the goat grub because he gets results and gets doughie forwards sent off.
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u/shadyFS91 Parramatta Eels 2d ago
You've had one okay season.. weird take mate. Difference is when I say Reed cried, I mean he was literally crying.. with tears lmao
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u/DinBizzz Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 2d ago
Gutho spends more time with his hands in the air than someone at a YMCA concert.
Eels fans really love living in the past
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u/shadyFS91 Parramatta Eels 2d ago
To the ref... God forbid he try and get the ref to open their eyes?... Lol Reed tries to start shit directly with other players only when his team is on top.. when not, he's sat with a box of tissues because he can't handle the pressure 😂
Bulldogs fans really are loud AF. One good season and you'd think they've won the world cup.
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u/DinBizzz Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 2d ago
Over. Every. Single. Call. Ever.
God dam right we are loud, haven’t had much to cheer for the last few years but I was still there cheering.
Salty tears of parra fans are far too sweet
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u/shadyFS91 Parramatta Eels 2d ago
Lol enjoy seething mate.. 😂 guess it's a bulldogs thing to cry hard
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u/I_Like_Vitamins Brisbane Broncos 3d ago
And when Elliott hit him half a second late this year, he ran up complaining to the ref sounding like he was about to cry.
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u/shadyFS91 Parramatta Eels 3d ago
Yea I remember that, except Reed was literally crying. I don't mean whinging I mean actual tears
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u/PsychologicalCup1672 South Sydney Rabbitohs 3d ago
My niggler, even res grade local comp players be practicing sledging off the field
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u/loz9999 I love my footy 3d ago
It works when targeted at players that get wound up easily and explode. I remember in 2021 Will Chambers going at half the Warriors team and Kane Evans got so rattled he kept reacting and got sin binned twice lol.
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u/theflyingkiwi00 Melbourne Storm 3d ago
Kate Evans was a proper dumb fuck though, like in the upper echelon of dumb fuck nrl players
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u/Accomplished-Good664 Penrith Panthers 3d ago
Funny that, when Luai does it and certain players from Penrith and other clubs do it it was a blight on the game but Mahoney and Maloney it is funny and intelligent play.
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u/DrillholeAndWing Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
Mahoneys been copping it all year from everyone. I don't think either should cop it.
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u/Accomplished-Good664 Penrith Panthers 3d ago
I'm talking about the media
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u/DrillholeAndWing Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
Check Joey's, Gordys and other people's comments of Rees.
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u/improbablywrong- I hate my footy 3d ago
Have you read a match or post match thread for the dogs? This whole sub wants to fight mahoney.
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u/Accomplished-Good664 Penrith Panthers 3d ago
I'm talking about the media.
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u/PatWoodworking Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 2d ago
Certain people do be deemed "uppity" a lot quicker than others....
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u/death_by_laughs Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
I think it's funny when Luai does it
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u/Safe_Pumpkin2620 South Sydney Rabbitohs 3d ago
what he did to brooks the other week was a good example
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u/Accomplished-Good664 Penrith Panthers 3d ago
It's fine, it's just that this article is basically racist. Luai is no different to Maloney a point I have made for years.
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u/PatWoodworking Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 2d ago
I've not met Emma Kemp but I've not read anything suss from her. There are other league journos I've met who are that way, and some you can figure out certainly are. I've heard one high profile journo describe the late noughties Warriors as requiring "more salt to balance out the pepper" in a bloody public work environment which was pretty wild.
You're right that a large chunk of the outsized dislike for Luai is racial, but I don't think this particular article is that.
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u/thore4 Brisbane Broncos 2d ago
What club did Maloney play for again?
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u/Safe_Pumpkin2620 South Sydney Rabbitohs 2d ago
and he was seen as a larrikin for all his incidents
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u/Accomplished-Good664 Penrith Panthers 2d ago
FFS the point I am making is when Luai did it you had the media saying he needs to get smacked in the mouth when Maloney did it it was all good Jimmy wins etc.
It's painfully obvious why that is the case same as why Mahoney doing it is great theatre when it wasn't before.
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u/TechnologyFeisty8728 South Sydney Rabbitohs 3d ago
Australia is a racist country.
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u/Safe_Pumpkin2620 South Sydney Rabbitohs 1d ago
it's funny you getting downvotes for this. When it's racism for some players, and not racism for others
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u/TechnologyFeisty8728 South Sydney Rabbitohs 1d ago
When white players do it they’re loveable larrikins and master tacticians.
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u/Safe_Pumpkin2620 South Sydney Rabbitohs 1d ago
yep couldn't agree anymore. And there's always some whataboutism with latrell or luai like why isn't alex johnstone or to'o hated for their race? The comparison should be to similar white players who are 'grubs', and you can see there is a clear difference. Also interesting to see latrell and luai are vocal about their respective cultures
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u/TechnologyFeisty8728 South Sydney Rabbitohs 1d ago
Latrell said something pretty poignant in the pre match coverage for Origin. It was something like “if I kept my mouth shut I’d be the best player in the world”. He also said things like “I don’t know why you [media] all hate me so much”.
Aus has tall poppy syndrome. We like our public figures to follow a certain practice. Anything outside that scope is ridiculed.
I ask people this….who broke Mansour’s face? who broke Soliola’s face? Who broke RCG’s face? Most can’t answer.
Who broke Manu’s face?
It’s not just bigotry that’s racism. The disproportionate amount of hate relevant to the act is proof.
What’s Luai ever done off field? Nothing.
What’s Joey done off field? Everything. Yet, Joey is a beloved larrikin. (Not hating on Joey lol)
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u/Safe_Pumpkin2620 South Sydney Rabbitohs 1d ago
I agree. The double standards is the biggest thing. I get luai and latrell have more than a few grubby incidents, but compare them to white grubs and pests and it's a crazy difference in treatment. Tall poppy syndrome in australia (mainly in regional parts, non-multicultural places and 'old-fashioned' places are the worst I've noticed). A lot of it is also classist as well as racist. There is a elite mentality when it comes to latrell who comes from a humble background in Taree and luai from outer sydney in mt druitt as opposed to the big city dwellers. Most people can't see that they subconsciously have a bias there, and revert to the old 'race card' argument which is overused, just as ironically cries of 'racism' is overused
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u/Immediate-Meeting-65 I love my footy 3d ago
I think the problem with Penrith was just the volume of grubs. For a while their you had May, Crichton, Luai, Naden. And they were all still young and hadn't won shit yet. I think that's where it came from.
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u/I_Like_Vitamins Brisbane Broncos 3d ago
It's less admirable and entertaining in the current era because they hide behind the no punching rules. Ennis and the like pissed off the opposition forwards during a time when they ran the risk of getting decked.
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u/thankyoupancake Eastern Suburbs Roosters 3d ago
Forget rugby league, Australia’s most talented niggler has always been Paul Keating. Arguably no figure in any sport has understood how to get under an opposition’s skin with quite the same persistent mordacity as the former prime minister in the ’90s. “How you going over there, Curl(''), he simply mimed reeling in the imaginary fish he’d just caught. “This is a salmon that actually jumps on the hook for you,” he said, high on his own supply, before eyeing Peter Costello and John Howard on the frontbench. “In fact, there are three or four of them there.”
Love him or not – and he is polarising – Keating commanding a room of adversaries was a rare act of theatre. One worthy of an actual theatre adaptation, and even a 65,000-member Facebook group called The Paul Keating Insult Appreciation Society. If he played cricket, he would probably be motor-mouthing at first slip. If he played rugby league, he might give Reed Mahoney a run for his money. And in 2024 that would be saying something, given Mahoney’s blossoming reputation as a peerless wind-up merchant.
There’s a chirpiness about the Canterbury hooker that seems to qualify him as an automatic entrant to every little on-field flare-up and guarantee him as a recipient of headbutts (Alex Seyfarth) and tunnel dust-ups (Jack Hetherington). Those two incidents in consecutive games cost Mahoney $2800 in fines, but they cost Seyfarth and Hetherington more in mental fortitude (and the latter a one-match ban). All hot and bothered by a sharp tongue and a glint in the eye.
If niggling is an art, Mahoney is Monet. An impressionist with spontaneous execution, violating norms with unconstrained brushstrokes and pissing off the conventional types wedded to the spirit of the game. But does it actually work?
To fans of every NRL team bar the Bulldogs, Mahoney is an excuse-in-waiting. He is a name on the tips of tongues when a player from their own side is sanctioned – because “Reed Mahoney does this every single week and gets nothing for it”. To Bulldogs supporters “he may be a grub, but he’s our grub”. It is an important distinction, in that both allude to at least some value in the nuggety No.9’s extracurricular activities.
Canterbury have arguably needed a grub for some time (approximately the seven seasons spent outside the finals, including one wooden spoon and two second-last finishes), and appear to be reaping the benefits of the little man in their corner riling up some of the bigger men and then pitying the “big-man syndrome” he said fuelled their retaliations.
His coach Cameron Ciraldo praised his player for stopping rivals from “walking all over” the Bulldogs, who sit sixth on the ladder at the regular season’s halfway point. “Our team in the past has been stood over and there’s been nothing done about it,” Ciraldo said last month. “They’ve made a pact this year that they’re not going to let that happen any more, and Reed’s a leader who loves his mates. If something happens, he’s going to be the first one there. That’s the sort of team we want to be.”
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u/thankyoupancake Eastern Suburbs Roosters 3d ago
Rivals, meanwhile, may become frustrated not only while actually playing against Mahoney, but also in the weeks leading up to playing him. The 26-year-old’s reputation for infamy now almost precedes him, and – as they say – anticipation can be worse than the experience itself. In theory, this could create anticipatory anxiety and overthinking which can detract from performance. Conversely, the knowledge you are about to play a known agitator may have the opposite effect, providing ammunition for an enhanced performance where there would have otherwise been none.
Most of the evidence for either side is only anecdotal. Anything beyond that would constitute a rigorous, perhaps impossible, undertaking for social scientists. Because how to do you measure the capacity of one individual – the sole owner of their unique set of genetics, learned behaviours, idiosyncrasies, and culture and socio-economic background – to irritate another individual possessing their own singular set of the above?
The variables are infinite. What annoys one person might endear another. What angers one might make another laugh, or have no effect at all. A particular word or even the tone of a voice could elicit vastly different feelings depending on the nature of the recipient’s experiences and insecurities.
Nevertheless, some academics have tried. A 2018 paper in the Journal of Sports Sciences, titled Effects of antisocial behaviour on opponent’s anger, attention, and performance, attempted to uncover whether sledging in sport actually works. The researchers paired up novice basketballers for a free-throw shooting exercise, with the aim of shooting more baskets than the other from 10 attempts each. As each was about to take their turn, the other was instructed to either verbally distract them (“Make sure your laces are done up”; “Look at that squirrel”) or anger them (“Not sure those clothes suit you”; “A blind man would score better than you”).
The study found “the participants in the insult group responded to verbal comments with more anger than did those in both the distraction and control groups” but that, overall, “contrary to our hypothesis, verbal antisocial behaviour by an opponent had no direct effect on performance of the basketball free-throw shooting task”. The authors postulated this may be the case because, while some athletes are negatively affected by sledging, others found it motivating.
There are obvious limitations to such research, such as ethical restrictions on the severity of insulting language used, and the absence of real-life jeopardy. In short, being told your hair doesn’t look good for the purposes of an academic study does not replicate the feeling of being hounded by thousands on the hill at Brookie for 80 minutes. Or perhaps being called a “reserve grader” (the late Terry Hill), or “barge-arse” (Paul Langmack to Andrew Johns) or “two attempted chips off the old block” (Ricky Stuart to Scott Sattler and Jeff Wittenberg, the sons of champion props John Sattler and John Wittenberg).
So, if there are instances when it does work as a tactic, what makes one a skilled niggler? Cricket seems an excellent place to start. Steve Waugh was the master of “mental disintegration” – his own personal brand of sledging. Australia’s most successful Test captain preyed on the opposition’s mind by identifying vulnerabilities to work with. From there it was a matter of creating enough uncertainty to plant the seed of self-doubt, and target it until they were paralysed into defeat.
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u/thankyoupancake Eastern Suburbs Roosters 3d ago
But it’s still hard to go past the time the late Shane Warne and Darren Berry welcomed Michael Slater to the crease during a Sheffield Shield match with “Tick” (Warne), “Tock” (Berry), “Tick” (Warne), “Tock” (Berry) to imply the combustible opener was a timebomb. The pair continued in that manner for several overs until Slater holed out at deep midwicket and both shouted “Kaboom!” in unison.
The counterpoint to the sledging enthusiasts is that the current Test contingent are a group of veritable nice guys and still enjoying a run of happy results under a clean-skin skipper in Pat Cummins.
In league land, more recent players with a particular talent for pot-stirring include Michael Ennis and James Maloney, according to Paul Gallen, who played alongside both for NSW and Cronulla.
“I think Ennis would practise it,” Gallen said in 2020. “He would pick a player or two throughout the week and he would practise. He went into the game and some of the things he would say on the field, they weren’t rehearsed, but they were just so perfect.
“James Maloney, he was just more off the cuff. He just had that quick wit about him that if someone said anything or did anything wrong in the game he would just BANG! Click straight back and give it to them.”
Ennis ‘The Menace’ had run-ins with Benji Marshall, Nathan Hindmarsh and Corey Parker throughout his career, and even mocked the Canberra fans’ Viking Clap in response to “relentless” heckling from the stands during Cronulla’s 2016 finals win over the Raiders en route to their maiden premiership. Off the field, the 40-year-old is generally regarded as a character and generally decent human – even by those he provoked.
Others learned their craft early. Johns has recounted the sledging he regularly copped from a 12-year-old Brett Finch during his maiden first grade season with Newcastle. Finch, whose father was coaching the Knights’ reserve grade side, was assigned as Johns’s sand boy.
“We’d be playing at good old Marathon Stadium back in the day, and I’d be having to kick to win the game or to go eight points up – this is back in the glory days, we’d have 28,000 there,” Johns told Wide World of Sports. “Finchy would run on with these little bucked teeth, and he’d give me the sand and go ‘you won’t kick this’.
“I said ‘what?’ and he said, ‘you want kick this, fat arse’. I said ‘mate, would you beat it’. Then I’d be lining my kick up and he’d be behind me going ‘you won’t kick it, you won’t kick it’.”
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u/thankyoupancake Eastern Suburbs Roosters 3d ago
Adolescents aside, league was different back then. A smart-arse remark would get the culprit dropped on his backside. But since the biff was banned, physically smaller players are more free to lay the bait without risking physical retaliation. In other words, as Johns said last month in relation to Mahoney, “there’s no fear of being punched in the head”.
“There’s no natural justice on the field,” he said. “There’s no consequences. And for little blokes to run up to big blokes and carry on and get in their face, it drives me mad.”
The by-product in the modern-day game is that players must be better equipped to handle psychological warfare. John Novak, a sports mindset expert who has worked with athletes, coaches and teams across an array of sports including rugby league, says training in “getting used to sniping” factors into his holistic approach.
“Your ultimate aim is to be impenetrable. I teach athletes about the impenetrability of messaging. It’s sticks and stones [messaging],” says Novak, who counts Des Hasler, Daly Cherry-Evans, Moses Mbye, Ennis, Craig Fitzgibbon and James Graham among his former students.
“An example would be [asking them], ‘if someone’s walking down the road and pointing to you and screaming [obscenities], what would you do?’ They’d say ‘well, I just wouldn’t take any notice of it’.
“At the end of the day, the voice you listen to is the inner voice of your own power. That’s an essential 101 … and not just on a field – it’s an extension of what we’re doing [in life]. If I’m receiving information which is negative that doesn’t help me, why would I entertain and engage it? It is hugely important, because remember we’ve got the crowd sledging too, and referees talking, social media.
“You prepare for all contingencies, one of which is your opponent. And if your opponent’s going to be talking about something that has nothing to do with what you’ve prepared for, then you’ve either got things you say, or a body that always is engaged more than your opponent’s. Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, so you’re actually strengthening me. Michael Jordan would be looking at a situation, and he would target the very person who’s coming in his face because that’s his opportunity to grow.”
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u/thankyoupancake Eastern Suburbs Roosters 3d ago
Many an NBA player tested the mental mettle of Michael Jordan and suffered the consequences. They included Reggie Miller, who in 2015 recalled an encounter with the Chicago Bulls great during his rookie year with the Indiana Pacers.
Michael Jordan
“We were playing an exhibition game [and] most veterans do not like to play in exhibition games, they want to get to the real thing,” Miller said on Jimmy Kimmel Live!. “I’m a wide-eyed, energetic rookie, and Michael’s going through the motions. And Chuck Person, who’s on my team – who is a trash-talker as well – is like, ‘can you believe Michael Jordan, the guy everyone’s talking about, who’s supposed to be able to walk on water? You’re out here killing him, Reg. You should be talking to him’.
“And I was like, ‘you know what, you’re right’. ‘Michael, who do you think you are? The great Michael Jordan? That’s right, there’s a new kid in town.’ He kind of looks at me and starts shaking his head. So at half I have 10, and he has four points. End of the game he ended up with 44, and I ended up with 12. And as he’s walking off, he’s like “be careful, you never talk to black Jesus like that’.”
Black Jesus, as it turns out, is not easily ruffled. And in general, evidence pointing to the niggle as a fruitful practice is limited. It is certainly more art than science, which may just be the pertinent point. Because if it does not consistently shift results in the manner intended, but also does not cause harm by crossing the line into unacceptable territories such as race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation or family, is it not simpler to just enjoy it for what it is? As a performance in itself that enhances sporting theatre?
Is Mahoney doing his best to be an annoying little pest? Of course he is. Is it fun to watch? About as much fun as watching Keating call Howard a “little desiccated coconut”.But it’s still hard to go past the time the late Shane Warne and Darren Berry welcomed Michael Slater to the crease during a Sheffield Shield match with “Tick” (Warne), “Tock” (Berry), “Tick” (Warne), “Tock” (Berry) to imply the combustible opener was a timebomb. The pair continued in that manner for several overs until Slater holed out at deep midwicket and both shouted “Kaboom!” in unison.
The counterpoint to the sledging enthusiasts is that the current Test contingent are a group of veritable nice guys and still enjoying a run of happy results under a clean-skin skipper in Pat Cummins.
In league land, more recent players with a particular talent for pot-stirring include Michael Ennis and James Maloney, according to Paul Gallen, who played alongside both for NSW and Cronulla.
“I think Ennis would practise it,” Gallen said in 2020. “He would pick a player or two throughout the week and he would practise. He went into the game and some of the things he would say on the field, they weren’t rehearsed, but they were just so perfect.
“James Maloney, he was just more off the cuff. He just had that quick wit about him that if someone said anything or did anything wrong in the game he would just BANG! Click straight back and give it to them.”
Ennis ‘The Menace’ had run-ins with Benji Marshall, Nathan Hindmarsh and Corey Parker throughout his career, and even mocked the Canberra fans’ Viking Clap in response to “relentless” heckling from the stands during Cronulla’s 2016 finals win over the Raiders en route to their maiden premiership. Off the field, the 40-year-old is generally regarded as a character and generally decent human – even by those he provoked.
Others learned their craft early. Johns has recounted the sledging he regularly copped from a 12-year-old Brett Finch during his maiden first grade season with Newcastle. Finch, whose father was coaching the Knights’ reserve grade side, was assigned as Johns’s sand boy.
“We’d be playing at good old Marathon Stadium back in the day, and I’d be having to kick to win the game or to go eight points up – this is back in the glory days, we’d have 28,000 there,” Johns told Wide World of Sports. “Finchy would run on with these little bucked teeth, and he’d give me the sand and go ‘you won’t kick this’.
“I said ‘what?’ and he said, ‘you want kick this, fat arse’. I said ‘mate, would you beat it’. Then I’d be lining my kick up and he’d be behind me going ‘you won’t kick it, you won’t kick it’.”
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u/jamesnuge Parramatta Eels 3d ago
Mahoney gonna tell Nicho he's gonna do him slowly
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u/jubagchainlightning Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 2d ago
Put Nicho off big time two Missed goals and shanked a point blank field goal
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u/VictorTheViking Canberra Raiders 3d ago
I was playing cricket against a team of pommy bastards. When batting, one of them said “get ready for a catch boys”. Two balls later, I hit a sitter right to him. This sledging caper seems to work.
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u/Ownofalonelyfart I love my footy 3d ago
Sledging had the opposite affect on me… I’m a bad, bad, bad batsmen. I was playing against my old team, and they knew I was horrible. They were sledging me fierce from the first ball.
Blocked the first two, then on the third I hit a six on to the road.
I was as shocked as they were!
They stopped sledging me, and a couple of overs I was out, as usual.
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u/YossarianRespawned Penrith Panthers 3d ago
Mahoney dropped it cold coming out of his own end last week and none of the Roosters even bothered to give him a head pat
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u/YourFavouriteAlt Penrith Panthers 3d ago
Why risk a sin bin and a penalty against you for a head rub
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u/redmusic1 Eastern Suburbs Roosters 3d ago
Classy Roosters playing 4D, the best response to give a mouthy little fuck ( if a quick smack across the lips is a penalty ) is to cold shoulder them completely, pests that don't get a response usually end up imploding.
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u/theflyingkiwi00 Melbourne Storm 3d ago
Maloney played for the roosters, you don't get to complain about pests
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u/redmusic1 Eastern Suburbs Roosters 2d ago
Not complaining at all, I was a mouth on the field until I was 50, but I had 6'4" to back it up, win at all costs - every team needs 1 sometimes.
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u/GasManMatt123 Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
Sport is as much about the mental game as it is about the physical game. Mental tactics might not always work, but they don't have to. Sometimes you plant the seed and it'll grow later.
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u/YallRedditForThis Newcastle Knights 3d ago
It only works today because he knows he's not going to get smacked in the fucking mouth
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u/thisaintitkweef Newcastle Knights 3d ago
He thinks he is but he cries hard when things don’t go his way.
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u/jmck1973 I love my footy 3d ago
Bloody oath it works! It's always the hookers they have a small complex. I played prop and the amount of times the little bastards would throw up a sneaky slap or punch in the scrum was ridiculous. Benny Elias was the first torment I remember as a kid watching footy but no one did it better than Mick Ennis what an annoying twat he was.
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u/Ok_Leadership_491 Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 2d ago
I’d love to be out on the field and see what he actually says. I reckon it’s hilarious how many people fall for it
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u/jt4643277378 Newcastle Knights 2d ago
I’m still trying to figure out if he’s good enough to be that mouthy
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u/Cape-York-Crusader North Queensland Cowboys 3d ago
I was king of the 2nd row sledgers back in my day, just simple stuff like ‘soft’ or ‘run it again mate’, didn’t win any friends but upset a lot of game plans
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u/GasManMatt123 Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs 3d ago
Yeah, it works. Sport is as mental as much as it is physical. You can't always see the effects of being a pest at the time, sometimes there's a delayed response - you plant a seed and let it grow later. The more you can put your opposition off, ruin their routine and frame of thought, the better. Good pests know who to rattle