Warrington Wolves • War of the Roses

I started watching in the late 80s. In my lifetime watching rugby league, the sport peaked in two eras.

First was mid 90s just before Super League, around the time of that 94 Kangaroos tour. There were legends of the game in both hemispheres. Still my favourite ever time in the game.

Then when Super League came in, there were a few years of disruption especially in Australia, but also a lot of iconic players either retired or went back to rugby union when it turned professional. The standard really fell in the late 90s. But it started to pick up again around the turn of the millennium.

Second peak was mid 00s. It was around the time we had Andrew Johns. The quality of Super League, especially at the top end, was fantastic. There were three absolute powerhouses in Bradford, Saints and Leeds. All of them were big, physical and could play fantastic rugby. I remember thinking then that the sport was really heading in the right direction and Super League / summer rugby had been a fantastic success.

Then there was a steady decline. It was slow at first and for Wire fans we probably got distracted by our era of relative success under Tony Smith. I really started to notice the decline of the game after the great Leeds team broke up and their legends retired one by one. There was nothing really there to replace them. There were well coached teams in Wigan and Saints but the quality of player was way down on what they had before.

This is the longest downward swing that I can remember. For many years RL fans used to complain about the lack of ambition and advertising from the RFL. We used to say that the game was so good it would sell itself, all you needed to do was introduce somebody to it and they would be a fan for life. I don't believe that now and haven't believed it for a long time. It exists really as a part of culture in northern towns and club loyalty is what is keeping it going rather than the great product on the field.