With international rugby league back into full swing upon the completion of the inaugural Pacific Championships, many have urged the NRL to continue to increase the fixture list during the season.
As currently slated, international sides get two or three games at the end of each NRL season with a World Cup every four years.
With New Zealand and English players unable to play in State of Origin, players from both nations have urged ARLC Chairman Peter V’landys to re-introduce the mid-year Test matches.
New Zealand Kiwis winger Ronaldo Mulitalo specifically called on V’landys to add more fixtures to the international calendar after stating non-Origin players can only sit back and watch the marquee series of the NRL season.
SEN’s Scott Sattler backed the push from the players but remained wary of the complaints from the RLPA about the amount of games in the regular NRL season.
“You say that when you’re full of adrenaline after a win,” Sattler said on SEN 1170 Sportsday.
“But then you go back as part of the RLPA and say, ‘We’re playing too much rugby league’, so, if they want to play an ANZAC Test and more Test matches, it has to be driven by the players.
“Probably not so much Australia versus New Zealand but New Zealand versus Tonga (and) Samoa.”
Sattler also brushed off claims that players would opt against being selected for their nations if they were put up against minnow nations.
“You want to wear the green and gold or black and white against Russia if that’s the only Test you’re ever going to play, you don’t care (who you play),” Sattler added.
“If they had a weekend where it’s just Origin and you had, Samoa, Tonga, New Zealand, Fiji Cook Islands and Papua New Guinea, what a festival of rugby league that would be.”
The NRL and ARLC have remained quiet on responding to the player’s calls for now.