Whenever there's a debate between Australian union and league fans, someone will very quickly raise the question of World War One.
League, so the argument goes, only became the dominant rugby code in Australia because union stopped playing during the war. The implication is that rugby league took advantage of the war to get the upper-hand over union.
But nothing in this debate is quite as it seems, so this week's episode looks at how the war-time league/union divide reflected much deeper divisions in Australian society.
You can find more information on the rugby codes in World War in Rodney Noonan’s paper of rugby league in the great here; in Tom Hickie’s books A Sense of Union: A History of Sydney University FC (1998) and The Game for the Game Itself : The Development of Sub-District Rugby in Sydney (1983).
The Glebe-Balmain rugby union team in Sydney, which went through the 1917 season with just two losses.