Rugby league icon calls on sport to start selling its best players better
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SAM Burgess has called on rugby league to become better at selling itself. The Warrington coach and dual-code England star knows the 13-a-side code’s product is as good as any, but not many people know that. Promoter Eddie Hearn claimed the sport is ‘dying’ as there are no nationally known superstars.
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And Burgess believes changes can propel the sport to a new level, starting with reducing the number of games. He said as he prepares for his second season back in England after a decade in Australia, where the NRL is huge: “The game last year was brilliant, the product was outstanding.
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“But I think a lot of the stuff around that needs to be better. “Sell out stadiums. Make players known nationwide. Grow who we are. Things can be done better, no doubt about it. “One way we do that is take some games out, there are too many with loop fixtures.
![[a man stands in front of a sign that says betfred super league]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/AM20235.jpg?strip=all&w=960)
“We’d play 22 if we played everyone home and away and it makes the product way better. “Have a couple of bye weeks in there. In those, you play a Yorkshire v Lancashire series and make that special. “Hull KR came to us twice last year. I guarantee if they came once, everyone wants to go and see Mikey Lewis and Jared Waerea-Hargreaves play, so they get a ticket for that game because it’s only one game.
“I’d have this conversation with anyone. I'm not coming at the game here. The game probably heard it all before. But the product’s good enough, so let's sell it.”. Burgess has seen off the threat of the NRL to keep hold of hooker Danny Walker, who signed a new deal until 2029.
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