PLAYER Wally Lewis Discussion

[GCBRONCO]

 

[theshed]

Sorry for the thread hijack guys. If any mods are awake it would be awesome if you could move this to a Wally Lewis thread because I would really enjoy discussing it further.

 

[GCBRONCO]

He would be 13 if he played today I think

He played a lot of lock early on and sometimes for the Broncos.

 

[GCBRONCO]

I’m watching game 2 1991 right now. Hopefully I can find game 3 on YouTube next

Hauff had a blinder of a series in 1991

 

[FaithinHook]

A few glorious moments in this highlights package. As well as being a genius attacking-wise, Wally was also a brutal defender (complete opposite of Locky there to be honest)

He just had it all.

 

[Foordy]

imagine how good Wally could have been in the professional era of today ... instead of an era where a beer, a pie and a smoke was considered recovery

 

[rnabokov]

Check out Game 3 of the 1991 SOO. It was my first exposure to RL and I fell in love with the sport on that night.

Pretty much the same for me. I'd been out of of RL for over 20 years till i watched Wally play. Instant rekindling of my love for the sport. Typified for me everything a class RL player was about. Still one of my icons.

 

[GKDonkey]

A few glorious moments in this highlights package. As well as being a genius attacking-wise, Wally was also a brutal defender (complete opposite of Locky there to be honest)

He just had it all.

Awesome to watch
Can't say I really had ever watched his highlights before. So I haven't appreciated his greatness. Just was the complete package.

How good are those broncos cheerleaders uniforms though

 

[FaithinHook]

Awesome to watch
Can't say I really had ever watched his highlights before. So I haven't appreciated his greatness. Just was the complete package.

How good are those broncos cheerleaders uniforms though

I know right! Also, just watching some of those Broncos plays/tries is enough to make you weep in the context of what we have become over recent years.

 

[Highwayman]

So broncos fans who were around for both unanimously say Wally is better than Lockyer?

I wonder if I can find old games. Any suggestions what games to start with?

I was around for both (although a young kid when Wally played). Pretty hard to compare eras, tbh. If Lewis were starting out today I don't doubt he'd rise to a high stature in the game. Probably play origin. Would he be remembered as one of the all time greats? Maybe. Impossible to say. If you go watch league matches from the late 80s, the game's so different it's practically a different code.

If picking a greatest bronco of all time for me it's between Lockyer & Langer.

 

[GKDonkey]

I was around for both (although a young kid when Wally played). Pretty hard to compare eras, tbh. If Lewis were starting out today I don't doubt he'd rise to a high stature in the game. Probably play origin. Would he be remembered as one of the all time greats? Maybe. Impossible to say. If you go watch league matches from the late 80s, the game's so different it's practically a different code.

If picking a greatest bronco of all time for me it's between Lockyer & Langer.

One thing that stood out for me in the first 32 minute video was how good Langer was

 

[Highwayman]

One thing that stood out for me in the first 32 minute video was how good Langer was

Yeah, he was brilliant. Not saying objectively the best, but my personal all time fav player.

 

[heartly87]

I went back and watched all the greats from the 90s but I never cared to look into the Wally hype because I’ve always hated his head and dry tofty personality Obviously I’ve seen footage here and there and heard all the stories but I never did a real deep dive.

Mate when I was young bloke, just after he had retired he came up to Mackay to do a little tour with the Broncos side of that year. He was an absolute Legend to me as a young bloke of about 6 or 7. Me and the family followed them around to a bunch of local bars and training fields and every place I was yelling Wally, Wally, he remembered my name, signed my shirts and ball, never once treated me like the pest I was.

In regards to his playing I remember the1991 Origin series I would have been 4. I still remember him standing up to MG. He was good on the ball, could hit in defence and was tough. If you can find the test where he scores under the post against France from memory he cops a head high and few punches in the face on his way over, pure determination and grit. I watched as much as I can find on youtube and its worth it. There are some full leghth vids of him playing for valley and wynnum on youtube that are worth a watch also.

 

[heartly87]

 

[heartly87]

@ 1:17 you can see the French or poms giving him hell as he scores, from the looks they gouge his eyes, punch and choke the bloke. What a tough guy he was.

 

[TheGreatCornholio7]

Greatest player to ever play the game. Dont let his on camera persona fool you

Wally was a hype job and not fit to tie Langers boot laces. Also he was a grub not adverse to spitting in the face of an opponent.

 

[TheGreatCornholio7]

There’s footage of him on YouTube. Bloke was fucking good.

Yeah I saw a game on YouTube I think it was 92 when he was captain/coach of the seagulls against the bulldogs, his idea of attacking moves was a run around with his halfback Lol he must have done it 5 times in that game and got smashed every single time

 

[soup]

Wally was a hype job and not fit to tie Langers boot laces. Also he was a grub not adverse to spitting in the face of an opponent.

**** me, and I thought you couldn’t be any more irrelevant on this forum. Congratulations, you’ve just outdone yourself.

Oh and BTW, Langer was my favourite player, too. Doesn’t mean he was better than the King.

 

[kooly87]

With so much quality footage available on Youtube these days it really is pretty inexcusable for Broncos/Queensland fans who were too young to have seen him play live to claim ignorance about just how good he really was as a player. Do yourself a favour, sit down and WATCH this if you really love Rugby League.

Honestly, if you've only really come into Rugby League in the NRL era and have grown used to, particularly in the last decade, a more robotic and structured standard of footy, you'll honestly be pretty blown away by just how incredibly natural and seemingly off the cuff Wally looked at times and just how easy he often seemed to do it all.

The closest thing I can compare a lot of this footage to is the times on the old Footy Show when they used to show highlights of park/junior footballers on low quality footage with a couple of guys just absolutely carving up opposition that looks several levels below them. Wally's highlight videos, right down to the grainy footage, are so often almost exactly like that.

A perfect blend of Cam Smith's composure, coolness and on field authority, Darren Lockyer's freakish ability to nail a clutch play under pressure, coupled with JT's ability to play above his weight and seemingly almost 'will' himself and his side into a winning play, and an almost Gorden Tallis like level of physicality that no other elite Half I've ever seen could even come close to - which to me puts him up there as the best of the lot.

 

[NSW stables]

Wally was a competitor and just had an aggressive will to win any contest (something our team lacks now). What i forgot was the amount of tackle busts he made because he would not surrender into a tackle.

What is not often commented on is that he was much like locky in that he had an innate capacity to read the play before it occured and put himself in the right position to capitalise (i.e supporting runners of the ball etc.)