Oct 25, 2026 · 16 min · 7 segments
Former Melbourne Storm star Christian Welch joins Poppy Penny to discuss all thing Rugby League World Cup, from the talent mismatch in the women's game, disappointing reporting and the importance of…
Christian WelchGuest
Poppy PennyHost
We're in the midst of a Rugby League World Cup and I want to start with the Gillaroos who played last night and they did a number on the English, 78-0.
It's actually this coming Wednesday is the three year anniversary since their last loss.
But there's also a bit of competitive balance there that has really opened up in the men's side of international rugby league.
For the listeners out there, the way there's a base level of prize money right um for for these rugby league world cups and so say if you make three weeks uh i believe it's two and a half thousand dollars each player is entitled to and then it progresses marginally semifinals final so then it's up to the international countries to do their own individual deal with their players so the australian rugby league commission have done a deal uh equal prize money for the men and women so the women and men both get $40,000 each for their World Cup services.
But this is very different to what the Samara and Tonga and Papua New Guinea can pay their players.
The discrepancy we're seeing is, you know, since 2017, there was that huge, huge moment when Jason Tomlolo and Andrew Fafita, who normally represent Australia and New Zealand, committed to represent Tonga.
Incredible players who probably would be walk-up starts for Australia and New Zealand, generally the two biggest nations.
They're able to make those sacrifices and represent their countries, you know, Samara and Tonga, Papua New Guinea, Fiji.
When Jerome Luai is on $1.2 million, he can forego a 40 grand payment and pick up three, four, five grand that Samar will be paying him.
To ask a player to forego $40,000 and sign up for... two to five thousand dollars it just doesn't make financial sense for these women who are still working part-time and it's just a growing pains i think of elite professional sport in the women's game that we haven't seen a dispersion of talent similar with aflw what we're seeing at the moment in terms of prize money equal prize money for the men and women right so the way north melbourne have such an incredible list and obviously they develop and coach and run a really good program but they can sign players to you know a much smaller salary but they're kind of banking on playing in three or four finals and probably winning a premiership.
So their salary is actually topped up to the top tier or tier two, whereas the battling clubs who aren't playing finals every year, they don't have the ability to kind of remunerate their players.
So sadly, I mean, for competitive balance in the women's game internationally, it's just really not there at the moment.
We're in the midst of a Rugby League World Cup and I want to start with the Gillaroos who played last night and they did a number on the English, 78-0.
It's actually this coming Wednesday is the three year anniversary since their last loss.
But there's also a bit of competitive balance there that has really opened up in the men's side of international rugby league.
For the listeners out there, the way there's a base level of prize money right um for for these rugby league world cups and so say if you make three weeks uh i believe it's two and a half thousand dollars each player is entitled to and then it progresses marginally semifinals final so then it's up to the international countries to do their own individual deal with their players so the australian rugby league commission have done a deal uh equal prize money for the men and women so the women and men both get $40,000 each for their World Cup services.
But this is very different to what the Samara and Tonga and Papua New Guinea can pay their players.
The discrepancy we're seeing is, you know, since 2017, there was that huge, huge moment when Jason Tomlolo and Andrew Fafita, who normally represent Australia and New Zealand, committed to represent Tonga.
Incredible players who probably would be walk-up starts for Australia and New Zealand, generally the two biggest nations.
They're able to make those sacrifices and represent their countries, you know, Samara and Tonga, Papua New Guinea, Fiji.
When Jerome Luai is on $1.2 million, he can forego a 40 grand payment and pick up three, four, five grand that Samar will be paying him.
To ask a player to forego $40,000 and sign up for... two to five thousand dollars it just doesn't make financial sense for these women who are still working part-time and it's just a growing pains i think of elite professional sport in the women's game that we haven't seen a dispersion of talent similar with aflw what we're seeing at the moment in terms of prize money equal prize money for the men and women right so the way north melbourne have such an incredible list and obviously they develop and coach and run a really good program but they can sign players to you know a much smaller salary but they're kind of banking on playing in three or four finals and probably winning a premiership.
So their salary is actually topped up to the top tier or tier two, whereas the battling clubs who aren't playing finals every year, they don't have the ability to kind of remunerate their players.
So sadly, I mean, for competitive balance in the women's game internationally, it's just really not there at the moment.
The rest of this transcript — segmented and speaker-labeled, so you land on the exact moment something was said
Search every transcript — by keyword, by phrase, or by meaning, across every show Radar indexes
Trends — what is surging across podcasts, measured against its own baseline
Alerts — when a name you follow appears in a newly indexed episode
No account is needed to search Radar.