LOUIS BURKE | Culture | Contact
With NRL fans, commentators and players alike unhappy with the league’s crackdown on any head contact, most believe it is the fans that will ultimately suffer (especially if the new rules are successful in stopping long-term head injuries for the players).
One example of this will surely be the 2021 NRL Best Tackle Compilation which at this point will mostly consist of blokes getting sin binned.
Known as one of the big pay days for noughties rapper Nelly, best tackle compilations are released both officially by the league and independent content creators, who are both going to have a pretty hard time putting a 2021 video together that doesn’t involve a few shots that got the attacking player in some strife.
“Check this one, Marty Taupau goes to put one on, gets knocked five metres back and then he gets sent off for ten!” stated NRL YouTuber GameOfGoldenHearts (GoGH).
“Every time someone puts on a shot the ref is acting like they’ve just been decapitated when in reality they’ve probably only had a mild brain trauma or something.”
“Gone soft, soon they’re probably going to outlaw those try celebrations where they are jumping over each other’s heads, all because it’s definitely going to kill someone one day.”
No matter how much GoGH and other pundits are keen to criticise the crackdown in social media posts and shouty podcasts, ARL Chairman Peter V’Landys has made it clear any whingers will be promptly directed to the nearest teaspoon of cement.
Fortunately for content creators like GameOfGoldenHearts, he has a season’s worth of best tries every month due to almost every game in 2021 being a 40-4 washout.
“It’s because defenders are too afraid to make a tackle and when they do, all the opposition’s going on like a bloody soccer player! Nelson Asofa-Solomona is going to be nominated for best actor, just you wait and see!”
