Book of Feuds details hate that exists between South Sydney Rabbitohs and Sydney Roosters

IT’S the greatest rivalry in rugby league - and it will explode again tonight. We reveal the history of the Souths-Easts hatred.

Russell Crowe celebrates a try by South Sydney's Lote Tuqiri during the Manly v South Sydney rugby league Second Qualifying Final at Allianz Stadium, Sydney. Pic Brett Costello

IT’S the greatest rivalry in rugby league.

Forged over more than a century of on-field battles and off-field feuds, hatred runs deep between the NRL’s only remaining foundation clubs - Souths and Easts.

And tonight’s preliminary final is just another instalment – a long-awaited one at the business end of the year given they have not clashed in a final since 1938, when the Roosters defeated the Rabbitohs 19-10 at the SCG.

Rabbitohs co-owner Russell Crowe.

If Souths win, they will advance to their first grand final since 1971, which is the longest drought of any current team.

Tonight’s game marks the 210th clash between the two clubs, with Souths winning 109 to the Roosters’ 95, with five draws.

However, in finals, the honours are even, with both sides winning five each.

Amazingly, the Roosters hold a 6-3 advantage at ANZ Stadium, despite the former Olympic venue now acting as an adopted home ground for the Rabbitohs.

Roosters powerbroker Nick Politis and captain Anthony Minichiello.

When Russell Crowe took over South Sydney, he commissioned the Book of Feuds to chronicle the rivalries and hatred that exists with other teams in the NRL.

This extract from the 2007 book by Mark Courtney spells out in no uncertain terms why such hostility exists and why so much is riding on tonight’s clash.

EXTRACT: “THERE is no greater rivalry in the NRL than that between the Rabbitohs and the Roosters. As the only remaining foundation clubs, they have played more matches between them than any other two clubs.

The clubs seemed to take turns at success, with long periods of superiority alternating between them ...

From 1948 to 1959, we won 17 out of 22 matches. Then we lost seven of the next eight, before winning 18 out of 21 games from 1963 to 1973, including the last Souths golden era, which brought four premierships from 1967 to 1971.

Sam Burgess is a key for Souths.

The Roosters did play a significant part, however, in bringing about the end of that golden era and have certainly contributed to our subsequent premiership drought. As we went into decline in the early ‘70s they moved into the era of professionalism.

They were the first club to display a sponsor’s name (City Ford) on their jumpers and, with the influx of cash, the results soon followed. They also worked out how to look after their players, and we paid the price.

In 1971 international winger Michael Cleary became the first of a long line of players to move from Redfern to Bondi Junction. He was soon followed by the great Ron Coote in 1972 and Test hooker Elwyn Walters in 1974, the last two being instrumental in the Roosters’ back-to-back 1974-75 titles.

As the league world turned upside down in 1995 with the emergence of Super League, so too did Souths’ fortunes. And as we battled to stay afloat, the Roosters seemed to take great delight in kicking us when we were down. Kicking us hard.

Stats from Fox Sports Stats.

They beat us 13 times in a row, along the way notching up scores of 62-0 on Anzac Day, 1996; 42-0 a year later; 30-6 the only time we played them in 1998; and 42-6 the only time we played them in 1999.

For Souths fans it was sickening, and it got a whole lot worse. As if it wasn’t bad enough that we were unceremoniously dumped from the competition in October 1999, the Roosters once again rubbed their very own brand of tricolour salt into our wounds.

Sonny Bill Williams will need to fire for the Roosters.

Already in deep shock as they faced the prospect of the 2000 season without their team, our fans then had to put up with the Roosters signing the most outstanding Souths junior for more than a decade, a player who had publicly stated he had, all his life, wanted to play his entire career at Souths: the majestic Craig Wing.

Then when we did get back into the competition in 2002, it was the Roosters who demanded we play our first game against them. They seemed to enjoy smacking us 40-6, and then again, 42-6, in the return game later that year.

In 2007, the Roosters carried on about their 100th year and predictably claimed they are the only foundation club to have played every season.

It seems there’s nothing they do that isn’t in some way aimed at us, or at imitating us. They changed their name twice to try and capture the inner-city market.

Yet, try as they might, there’s no escaping the cold hard facts that South Sydney were formed before Eastern Suburbs, have won far more premierships than Easts, Sydney City and Sydney Roosters combined, and have a much greater junior and fan base.

In the end it comes down to the souls of the two clubs. Although they are indeed a foundation club, somewhere along the way the Roosters lost their soul. They simply don’t have the tradition, the stories or the romance that is South Sydney.

Nevertheless, for more than 30 years, the Roosters had it pretty much their own way.

Professionalism. Sponsorship. The big end of town. We had to watch it all, green with envy. But that’s over now. The pendulum that has swung back and forth between our clubs for 100 years is back with us.

But the Roosters won’t ever surrender to us without one hell of a fight. To beat them takes more than our bodies, more than our hearts, and more than our minds. To beat them requires that we commit our souls to the spirit of the cardinal and myrtle: the creed of the Rabbitoh.”

Thanks to author Mark Courtney and the South Sydney Rabbitohs for permission to publish.

Originally published as Book of Feuds details hate that exists between South Sydney Rabbitohs and Sydney Roosters