Is the ground really that hard?

Since the start of the selection process started the same quote has been used up more times than a footballer dives

"he will be ideal for the hard grounds down under"

But what is that really based on?

Is it not winter there, has it not rained on most games and is the ground pretty much the same as our, flat with bit of squish in it.

Where did this fixation for 'hard running grounds' come from and is it remotely true?

Has some of the squad selection been made (well at least discussed here) with a completely false assumption?

Finally!

the grounds are harder, even in the winter time in the SH, well at least in SA. Its not just the current weather but the climate. Ground and pitches don't switch from being one extreme to the other on the seasons alone or overnight.

Pitches in SA are certainly different depending on their geographical position.

When the pitches have more moisture in them wouldn't you agree that the pace of the game is slower??? Players can't cover ground as quickly as they can under dryer conditions.

The game is different on the conditions certainly IMO. Can't speak for the ground in AUS mind but I expect it to be similiar.

The ground is bound to be a bit compacted in Aus given that the rest of the Earth is pressing down on it.

cyril.. how can that be given the world is flat?

The SH is the colder of the two hemispheres (even if it's agreed that the Earth is flat). The orientation of the planet towards the Sun means that that is a given.

Makes you wonder if there really is a God as by putting most of the land oop North, He had a sense of both humour and a place to deport the wastrels.

Rugby wouldn't be rugby unless you could say "the hard grounds down under" at least once a Northern Hemisphere season.

"The lad was crap today in the muck of that AP gyme with the rain pissin' on his head, like.  BUT...give him the hard grounds down under and he's easily the best wing out there today."

More a dark sense of humor as he left plenty of wastrels behind. 

The wastrels got the last laugh of course as they got the sun, sea, sand and Queensland's tropical beaches, as the sneering rich and judicial types got the smog, the cold, the wet and the dirty industrial homeland.  The blighters got the transportation sytem the wrong way round!

It should have been that if some low life stole your pig or a loaf of bread, you got shipped instead.

The Ground has got a thread going asking if POC is really that hard