Teams of the Past 20 Years

[mrslong]

OK, so there is an exclusive footy forum of which I am a member [icon_shady and we just had a manual draft to see who could come up with the best squad out of the players of the last 20 years (the rules are that they had to play an NRL/ARL game from 1988 to present). We've put it to a vote to see which team wins, and I thought it'd be interesting to see what the footy guru's in here thought were the best 3 teams. So post your vote if you are interested in a 3, 2, 1 fashion (3 being the best team, 1 being the worst).

Also the teams listed are in order of who got to pick first to last...

Yes, I have a team but I do not rate it as I was on holidays during the draft and didn't really put much thought into the players and just selected players I like. It should be fairly obvious which team is mine 8-) Anyway, it was a fun exercise for the uber-nerdy-footy fans.

Here are the teams:

Team A
1. Garry Jack 2. John Ferguson 3. Mark Coyne 4. Paul McGregor 5. Noa Nadruku 6. Johnathan Thurston 7. Allan Langer
8. Sam Backo 9. Danny Buderus 10. Greg Dowling 11. Ruben Wiki 12. Stephen Kearney 13. Wayne Pearce
Bench: 14. Des Hasler 15. Brent Todd 16. Jason Smith 17. Darren Smith

Team B
1. Clinton Schifcosfske 2. Lote Tuqiri 3. Gene Miles 4. Brad Izzard 5. Lesley Vainikolo 6. Cliffy Lyons 7. Andrew Johns
8. Peter Kelly 9. Jason Hetherington 10. Peter Johnston 11. Mark Graham 12. Trevor Gilmeister 13. Bradley Clyde
Bench: 14. Geoff Toovey 15. Mark Geyer 16. Hugh McGahan 17. Craig Smith

Team C
1. Michael Potter 2. Nathan Blacklock 3. Mal Meninga 4. Michael O'Connor 5. Rod Wishart 6. Wally Lewis 7. Steve Mortimer
8. Craig Young 9. Ben Elias 10. Paul Harragon 11. Craig Fitzgibbon 12. David Fairleigh 13. Ben Kennedy
Bench: 14. Craig Gower 15. Sonny Bill Williams 16. Jim Dymock 17. Paul Dunn

Team D
1. Matthew Ridge 2, Kerry Boustead 3, Greg Inglis 4, Steve Renouf 5, Michael Hancock 6, Darren Lockyer 7, Adrian Lam
8, Nathan Cayless 9, Luke Priddis 10, Petero Civoniceva 11, Steve Menzies 12, Andrew Gee 13, Paul Vautin
Bench: 14, Phil Blake 15, Jason Stevens 16, David Furner 17, Shaun Timmins

Team E
1. Gary Belcher 2. Ricky Walford 3. Andrew Ettingshausen 4. Brad Fittler 5. Matt Sing 6. Brett Kenny 7. Gary Freeman
8. Les Davidson 9. Mario Fenech 10. Luke Bailey 11. John Cartright 12. Ian Roberts 13. Gavin Miller
Bench: 14. Jason Croker 15. Peter Jackson 16. Paul Langmack 17. Mark Carroll

Team F
1. Anthony Minichello 2. Eric Grothe 3. Ryan Girdler 4. Shaun Berrigan 5. Dale Shearer 6. Ellery Hanley 7. Peter Sterling
8. Shane Webcke 9. Kerrod Walters 10. Robbie Kearns 11. Gordon Tallis 12. Willie Mason 13. Nic Kosef
Bench: 14. Brad Thorn 15. Stacey Jones 16. Billy Slater 17. Brent Kite

Team G
1. Brett Mullins 2. Wendell Sailor 3. Mark Gasnier 4. Jarrod McCracken 5. Martin Offiah 6. Laurie Daley 7. Ricky Stuart
8. David Gillespie 9. Royce Simmons 10. Steve Price 11. Adrian Morley 12. Luke Ricketson 13. Brad Mackay
Bench: 14. Greg Conescu 15. Quentin Pongia 16. Greg Florimo 17. Adam Muir

Team H
1. Tim Brasher 2. Mat Rogers 3. Terry Hill 4. Matt Gidley 5. Timanu Tahu 6 Terry Lamb 7. Scott Prince
8. Glenn Lazarus 9. Cam Smith 10. Dean Pay 11. Nathan Hindmarsh 12. Paul Sironen 13. Bob Lindner
Bench: 14. Craig WIng 15. Noel Cleal 16. Tonie Carroll 17. Jason Ryles

Team I
1. David Peachey 2. Willie Carne 3. Israel Folau 4. Kevin Iro 5. Daryl Halligan 6. Kevin Walters 7. Kurt Gidley
8. Steve Roach 9. Steve Walters 10. Martin Bella 11. Kevin Campion 12. Gary Larson 13. Tawera Nikau
Bench: 14. Greg Alexander 15. Ali Lauitiiti 16. Jim Serdaris 17. John Lomax

 

[Black Philip]

It's a bit tough, some of them have awesome backlines but their forwards are ordinary.

 

[mrslong]

Some of the teams have really orsm forward packs and mediocre backs. It just depends on what you think is more important to win...hmmm.

 

[BroncoMatt]

C is the best team there by a mile! So...

3 - C
2 - F
1 - H

 

[Jeza23]

Which one was yours mrslong? I am having a hard time picking it haha

 

[Jeba]

OK, currently bored, so am going to disect it a little [icon_wink

Outside backs - I think E just wins out from C here, despite Fittler spending much of his career at 5/8th he had some great seasons early on in his career in the centres for the Panthers. Also, Belchar, ET and Sing in the one backline is a bloody luxury!! Walford was no slouch either. E.

Halves - C, just from A. Lewis and Mortimer are Rugby League royalty, and so is Langer, but Thurston isn't there just yet. So C.

Forwards - H by a mile here. All good packs but H is the standout.

Bench - This one was tough so I narrowed it down to the teams that were still in the hunt for my 3 points - C, E & H. Out of those I was most impressed by E, but very close. Coming into that round, C had a narrow advantage over H, but C had the worst bench. H had the 2nd best which in the end got them over the line.

3 - H
2 - C
1 - E

 

[mick]

3 - C
2 - G (can't believe no one else has this one yet. Mullins, Sailor, Offiah, Daley, Stuart, Gillespie, Price, Morley - class all over)
1 - H

 

[ethos]

3 - C
2 - G (can't believe no one else has this one yet. Mullins, Sailor, Offiah, Daley, Stuart, Gillespie, Price, Morley - class all over)
1 - H

Don't wanna nit pick mick, but Morley? Classy? Nothing more than a cheap shot merchant I reckon.

 

[mick]

3 - C
2 - G (can't believe no one else has this one yet. Mullins, Sailor, Offiah, Daley, Stuart, Gillespie, Price, Morley - class all over)
1 - H

Don't wanna nit pick mick, but Morley? Classy? Nothing more than a cheap shot merchant I reckon.

That can be argued. But you need a mongrel of a bloke in the forwards who will bend that white line a little. Honestly, who would leave out Gee in an all-time Broncos spot? Guaranteed he'd be in the bench for more than half of them if we went through that exercise on this forum again.

 

[mrslong]

Interesting input guys, my team was D, which is totally out of the other teams leagues, but still as a Broncos fan it's got a nice backline. Quite a few of my players I wanted kept getting poached. By the time I got to chosing a half back and hooker pickings were very slim, which was a huge error on my part. Langer/Johns/Lewis were the top 3 players.

 

[stewartmannering]

I agree with Jebadude. Team H is incredible, what a brilliant forward pack!!

Now how do I go about changing my username, I've spelt Mannering wrong!

 

[Guv]

Team C by a mile [icon_wink

 

[stewartmannering]

Agreed too, Team H has an awesome forward pack but their outside backs are also quality. Hill, Rogers, Tahu in their prime....wow.

P.S. Give me a sec, I'll fix your username.

Cheers for fixing my username, I couldn't log in for a while and then typed in mannering and bingo.

Going back to the teams and yes Team H is absolutely brilliant. Hill, Rogers and Tahu you mention, also what about the brilliant Timmy Brasher at the back. You've also got Terry Lamb in there, he's probably the best backup player from the past 20 or so years.

Also worth noting that Team H has a tremendous adaptable bench, Jason Ryles is very underrated, and TC is obviously a living legend. Cleal was brilliant in SOO and Craig Wing is a great utility.

By the way I'll go...
Team H 3 points
Team C 2 points
Team A 1 point.

 

[mrslong]

Agreed too, Team H has an awesome forward pack but their outside backs are also quality. Hill, Rogers, Tahu in their prime....wow.

P.S. Give me a sec, I'll fix your username.

Cheers for fixing my username, I couldn't log in for a while and then typed in mannering and bingo.

[icon_lol1. [icon_lol1. [icon_lol1. [icon_lol1. [icon_lol1. [icon_lol1. [icon_lol1. [icon_lol1. icon_thumbs_u nice one.

Mannering is good, but Stewart? Pfft!

 

[mrslong]

Alright, so the winners were Team C by 1 point
Team E and
Team A

and they were my three picks.

 

[Je$ter]

Team G - Shit bench however.
Team F
Team C