Football versus Rugby

[OldNick]

I have no interest in rugby, but now when saints are playing I just want my life to jump 2hours so I don’t have to go through the disappointment

[Kingsland Codger]

I'm sat here being forced to watch 6 Nations. Just wondering if any Saints fans out there can enjoy both football and rugby? .... Don’t get it. Will someone enlighten me?

 

I enjoy watching both sports. With football I only really enjoy watching Saints and things that are Saints related. If, say, Steven Davis is playing for Northern Ireland or Dusan Tadic for Serbia I shall pay attention to the result and its implications ... maybe even watch some of it if the match is on TV. Most England matches are of no interest if there is no Saint playing.

 

However, with rugby I don’t support a specific club but will watch an international regardless who is playing. New Zealand v South Africa, Scotland v Wales, Australia v France ... love watching them all.

 

In short, I follow the Saints but not football per se whereas with rugby it is the sport I follow and not any team.

 

Does this answer help with your questions?

[Ziggy]

For years I had a season ticket with Cardiff Blues (with one son) and with Saints (the other son) and love them both. Rugby hasn’t been ruined by money yet.

[darren2]

Personally I prefer Rugby at the moment. Don't get me wrong, I've grown up watching and supporting Saints, but I much prefer the discipline, respect (Especially for the ref), and lack of crying at the slightest touch..... Rugby players make footballers look like 5 year old girls in my opinion

[John Boy Saint]

I have always liked football, I guess making the trips down the Saints from North Hampshire in my early teens cemented that. I hated Rugby Union probably because at the same time it was the first sport on the PE agenda at the school I went to, but jeez what (to me at the time) a frustrating game, all the games teacher seemed to be doing was blow his flipping whistle every 5 seconds, bizarrely I did enjoy watching Rugby League I guess because of the flow of the game by comparison. As I have gotten older I can quite happily sit through a 6 nations game and more often than not enjoy it, I suppose it’s a bit like never really enjoying Red Wine in my late teens and early twenties, and now it’s the first thing I peruse on the win3 list in a restaurant.

[mrfahaji]

I think a lot of the time it's about whether you spend the time to get the intracacies of the sport. One of the things that makes football so brilliant is it's accessibility and how easy it is to follow/understand - although of course there are also intracacies, as the debates on here will testify!

 

I've never been a fan of rugby, there's just something about it that doesn't appeal to me. And if I do ever see it I think it's pretty boring unless it's in the dying minutes with one team knocking on the door. But that could be said about any sport! I can't sit through hours of golf but I can watch the final green of the masters, I can't sit through a cricket game but would watch the last couple of overs with one team needing 10 runs to win.

 

American Football is a sport which I initially thought was awful, and then I started to show a bit of interest in it (a good friend followed it), before making the effort to learn about it and get into it. Now I think it's a great sport. Not a patch on Asssociation Football from a 'game' perspective, but from a competition perspective it's hard to knock the NFL while bigging up the Premier League. I saw one of the final "NFL Shows" with Mark Chapman the other day and Osi Umenyiora said "if I was a gambling man, I would put all my money into the NFL, because the product is just too good. The teams who aren't meant to win WIN, the teams who look unbeatable LOSE - anything can happen and everyone has a chance."

 

Not sure we will ever be able to say that about the Premier League, because the priorities are all wrong. But back to the original point - most sports (and things in life in general) become more rewarding the more time you take to learn and understand them. Still hate rugby though.