{"id":408497,"date":"2024-07-02T04:59:12","date_gmt":"2024-07-02T04:59:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=408497"},"modified":"2024-07-02T06:04:49","modified_gmt":"2024-07-02T06:04:49","slug":"disgraceful-crowd-leaves-english-great-fuming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=408497","title":{"rendered":"'Disgraceful' crowd leaves English great fuming"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rugby league great James Graham has blown up over an "embarrassing" crowd for an international fixture \ufeffbetween England and France last weekend.<\/p>\n

In a mid-season clash between the two sides, England would emerge as the 40-8 victors in Toulouse, with the likes of Jack Welsby and \ufeffGeorge Williams starring.<\/p>\n

But the biggest story to come out of the double-header, which also featured a women's match, was the disappointing turnout, with less than 5000 spectators in attendance.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Wimbledon favourite 'heartbroken' after difficult call<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Maroons issued 'please explain' over Origin act<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> 'She apologised': AFL admit huge umpiring blunder<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\ufeffSpeaking on The Bye Round<\/em>, Graham let loose at the game's organisers and raised concerns over the future of the international game.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

"I'm actually embarrassed about England rugby league … I don't even know if you can call it a crowd," he said.<\/p>\n

"It is beyond embarrassing, it is so bad the amount of people that were there. I love international rugby league and I loved playing for my country, but I felt sorry for the lads who had to endure playing in front of a couple of people and their dog.<\/p>\n

"That's not what you should be looking at the pinnacle of our sport, it was disgraceful. It actually pissed me off, it was so embarrassing \u2026 there's no excuse.<\/p>\n

"Go and have a look, you'd be shocked by how bad it is. It was that bad, I turned it off."<\/p>\n

Watch the 2024 NRL premiership live and free on Nine and<\/strong><\/em> 9Now<\/strong><\/em><\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

The crowd was less than an average Super \ufeffLeague game and those involved in the sport in the northern hemisphere are extremely worried about the attendance.<\/p>\n

\"James<\/p>\n

The comments from Graham – who made 44 appearances for his country – comes after Phil Gould called for the NRL to step in and help keep the game afloat overseas<\/a>.<\/p>\n

"The UK Super League is not doing as well financially as it possibly could and I think the game as a whole, we have an international board but it's rather a toothless tiger," he said on Nine's 100% Footy<\/em> on Monday night.<\/p>\n

"Our calendar is getting so congested at the back end of the season, we're playing too many months of the year, we need a rolling five-year calendar for domestic rugby league, international rugby league and other forms of representative football.<\/p>\n

"It can only be done if you've got one governing body for the lot."<\/p>\n

Graham however isn't sure the responsibility lies with the NRL.<\/p>\n

\ufeff"I don't know if it's on Australia to promote it or make people aware of it," he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rugby league great James Graham has blown up over an "embarrassing" crowd for an international fixture \ufeffbetween England and France last weekend. In a mid-season […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":408499,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408497"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=408497"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408497\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":408502,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408497\/revisions\/408502"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/408499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=408497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=408497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=408497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}