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It's now getting obvious that Ricky and his pals are News are on a crusade to cause us as much difficulty as possible regarding our playing roster. There are a few reasons. One is to protect Ricky's ineptness as a coach for a long as possible. Another is to have a shot at Gus. The usual one of being able to have a go at the roosters always features. They will never let the facts get in the way of an agenda.
I have managed to get my hands on a great email sent by a recently inducted roosters life member to Paul Kent after the blatantly false comments on NRL 360 last night. Here it is:
Dear Mr Kent
I tuned into a program on Fox Sports earlier this evening (NRL 360), in which you co-host. The segment, discussing the piece written about the Sydney Roosters in Phil Gould's column in Wednesday's 'Sydney Morning Herald', was so unbalanced and so erroneous that one could only conclude that damaging the reputation of Mr Gould, the Sydney Roosters, its staff and officials was your one and only intent.
It commenced with what is obviously a completely flawed premise that 'the salary cap is not working' and the Sydney Roosters roster is somehow proof of that. With five different premiers in the past five seasons I would have thought that this is not a proposition that can be sustained by even the most unhinged of journalists. The Roosters, having played finals football in only four of the past ten seasons and finishing last in 2009, are hardly the poster club for those of you promoting this ridiculous hypothesis. Neither is their record of two premierships in the past 39 seasons.
Your co-host Ben Ikin suggested that the assertion "I met a bloke at a barbeque that said the Roosters salary cap boss should run the country", in a column written by your colleague at News Limited, Paul Crawley, "sounds like a fair statement". Until recently I had not realised that News Limited and Fox Sports reliance on blokes journalists meet at barbeques had somehow become the primary source for determining the validity of NRL clubs' adherence to the salary cap.
When it came to your turn to speak you immediately declared Mr Gould "wrong" for suggesting the obvious - that the vast majority of players at the Roosters (and every other NRL club for that matter) are on 2015 contracts signed some years earlier. You went on to list a number of players that had signed contracts with the Roosters over the past few seasons suggesting that they signed them at their peak and as such we should conclude that the valuations made by the bloke Mr Crawley met at a barbeque must be correct. The problem with the list that you read was that you deliberately tried to mislead your audience by suggesting that contracts signed in the past six months by players somehow covered the current season. Here is just a sample of some players contract status that were presented by you in a calculated and deceptive manner to boost your erroneous assumptions, whilst simultaneously attempting to damage the reputation of a rival newspapers' columnist:
You would have been well aware of the facts concerning these players but stating that would have completely destroyed the entire premise that you were presenting, and so you took a leaf out of the Fox News manual and we were fed your 'fair and balanced' analysis of this clubs salary cap position.
In Thursday's 'Daily Telegraph' you go even further by suggesting that the players the Roosters have developed in putting their current squad together were those on the wish list of every NRL club but somehow ended up at the Roosters. Please help us out here Mr Kent? When the Roosters signed Daniel Tupou from Parramatta's NYC squad in 2011 whose radar was he on? How about Isaac Liu from the West Tigers NYC team of 2010? What about Sio Siua Taekehaeo who was plucked from the Warriors NSW Cup team of 2013? Aiden Guerra was at the Storm prior to joining the Roosters in 2010 - how many clubs, Mr Kent, even knew who he was? Sam Moa left the NRL in 2008, after one first grade game with Cronulla, considered not good enough for Australian professional rugby league. Can you please name the clubs that were circling him when he rejoined the NRL in 2013?
Dylan Napa, Mitchell Pearce, Kane Evans, Mitch Aubusson, Roger Tuivasa-Sheck, Boyd Cordner, Shaun Kenny-Dowall and Jake Friend all joined the Roosters as teenagers. Some, like Pearce and Cordner, were obvious talents but many of the others were chosen by the recruitment team at the Roosters for a myriad of other qualities, but rather than give them any credit you suggest that 'Blind Freddy' could have spotted them and the others on the Roosters roster as well. Well, in many cases 'Blind Freddy' or recruitment staff from any number of other clubs didn't see the talent in these players or weren't prepared to maybe spend a little more on them as youngsters on the basis that they would become future NRL players.
No, Mr Kent, they weren't from Bondi United. Why is that even relevant? The current junior league boundaries are based on demographics of the horse and buggy days. The Roosters make no secret of the fact that they are a recruitment club as they have no other choice! Not once have I read you or your News Limited colleagues write about the necessity to redraw the junior boundaries in NSW to give each club a fair share of junior league players, so without that change coming anytime soon the Roosters can either die or look for young talent and hope to develop them into NRL players - a job they have seemed to have done very well in recent years.
You have done yourself, your program and your publication a great disservice by the way you and some of your colleagues have reported this issue and I can only wish that you'll eventually discover that the 'Fox News Way' is a path ethical journalists do not choose to follow.
Best Regards
I have managed to get my hands on a great email sent by a recently inducted roosters life member to Paul Kent after the blatantly false comments on NRL 360 last night. Here it is:
Dear Mr Kent
I tuned into a program on Fox Sports earlier this evening (NRL 360), in which you co-host. The segment, discussing the piece written about the Sydney Roosters in Phil Gould's column in Wednesday's 'Sydney Morning Herald', was so unbalanced and so erroneous that one could only conclude that damaging the reputation of Mr Gould, the Sydney Roosters, its staff and officials was your one and only intent.
It commenced with what is obviously a completely flawed premise that 'the salary cap is not working' and the Sydney Roosters roster is somehow proof of that. With five different premiers in the past five seasons I would have thought that this is not a proposition that can be sustained by even the most unhinged of journalists. The Roosters, having played finals football in only four of the past ten seasons and finishing last in 2009, are hardly the poster club for those of you promoting this ridiculous hypothesis. Neither is their record of two premierships in the past 39 seasons.
Your co-host Ben Ikin suggested that the assertion "I met a bloke at a barbeque that said the Roosters salary cap boss should run the country", in a column written by your colleague at News Limited, Paul Crawley, "sounds like a fair statement". Until recently I had not realised that News Limited and Fox Sports reliance on blokes journalists meet at barbeques had somehow become the primary source for determining the validity of NRL clubs' adherence to the salary cap.
When it came to your turn to speak you immediately declared Mr Gould "wrong" for suggesting the obvious - that the vast majority of players at the Roosters (and every other NRL club for that matter) are on 2015 contracts signed some years earlier. You went on to list a number of players that had signed contracts with the Roosters over the past few seasons suggesting that they signed them at their peak and as such we should conclude that the valuations made by the bloke Mr Crawley met at a barbeque must be correct. The problem with the list that you read was that you deliberately tried to mislead your audience by suggesting that contracts signed in the past six months by players somehow covered the current season. Here is just a sample of some players contract status that were presented by you in a calculated and deceptive manner to boost your erroneous assumptions, whilst simultaneously attempting to damage the reputation of a rival newspapers' columnist:
- Aiden Guerra's contract signed in late 2014 is for seasons 2016 and 2017. His current three year deal expires at the end of this season, having been signed in 2012, when he was not an Origin or Test player, and to many was just a fringe first grader.
- Jared Waerea-Hargreaves contract signed last month is also for seasons 2016 and 2017. His three year 2013-2015 contract was signed in 2012.
- Dylan Napa's contract signed last month is also for seasons 2016 and 2017. His three year 2013-2015 contract was signed in 2012, before he had even played first grade.
You would have been well aware of the facts concerning these players but stating that would have completely destroyed the entire premise that you were presenting, and so you took a leaf out of the Fox News manual and we were fed your 'fair and balanced' analysis of this clubs salary cap position.
In Thursday's 'Daily Telegraph' you go even further by suggesting that the players the Roosters have developed in putting their current squad together were those on the wish list of every NRL club but somehow ended up at the Roosters. Please help us out here Mr Kent? When the Roosters signed Daniel Tupou from Parramatta's NYC squad in 2011 whose radar was he on? How about Isaac Liu from the West Tigers NYC team of 2010? What about Sio Siua Taekehaeo who was plucked from the Warriors NSW Cup team of 2013? Aiden Guerra was at the Storm prior to joining the Roosters in 2010 - how many clubs, Mr Kent, even knew who he was? Sam Moa left the NRL in 2008, after one first grade game with Cronulla, considered not good enough for Australian professional rugby league. Can you please name the clubs that were circling him when he rejoined the NRL in 2013?
Dylan Napa, Mitchell Pearce, Kane Evans, Mitch Aubusson, Roger Tuivasa-Sheck, Boyd Cordner, Shaun Kenny-Dowall and Jake Friend all joined the Roosters as teenagers. Some, like Pearce and Cordner, were obvious talents but many of the others were chosen by the recruitment team at the Roosters for a myriad of other qualities, but rather than give them any credit you suggest that 'Blind Freddy' could have spotted them and the others on the Roosters roster as well. Well, in many cases 'Blind Freddy' or recruitment staff from any number of other clubs didn't see the talent in these players or weren't prepared to maybe spend a little more on them as youngsters on the basis that they would become future NRL players.
No, Mr Kent, they weren't from Bondi United. Why is that even relevant? The current junior league boundaries are based on demographics of the horse and buggy days. The Roosters make no secret of the fact that they are a recruitment club as they have no other choice! Not once have I read you or your News Limited colleagues write about the necessity to redraw the junior boundaries in NSW to give each club a fair share of junior league players, so without that change coming anytime soon the Roosters can either die or look for young talent and hope to develop them into NRL players - a job they have seemed to have done very well in recent years.
You have done yourself, your program and your publication a great disservice by the way you and some of your colleagues have reported this issue and I can only wish that you'll eventually discover that the 'Fox News Way' is a path ethical journalists do not choose to follow.
Best Regards
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