Sweets and Elites
And so to another of these odd little short-rounds of this dear depleted National Rugby League and the list of players not available due to the great steaming hob-goblin called State of Origin runs to 34 of the game’s elite. And thirty-four is quite a lot of elites to pluck out of a national rugby league, it’s like the sweetest 10 per cent of the pudding whisked off the top with a massive spatula.
And thus does rugby league debate its very soul and gaze inwards and beyond to its very navel, for if there’s one thing rugby league does better than all the codes and sports and human endeavours of any kind – it’s gaze at its very navel. Rugby league finds its navel more interesting than all other codes, sports, human endeavours, everything. It’s a Thing.
And why not? Rugby league is tops. But when you’ve got just four games across the weekend and all with the star power of the sweet elites whisked from the top of the pudding with a spatula, etc, it’s … well. It’s Star Wars with Lou Gossett Junior – who you might remember from such films as Iron Eagle and Captive Heart: The James Mink Story – playing Obi Wan Kenobi. Which might even be sort of interesting. And maybe even be pretty good. But you’re selling more tickets with Sir Alec Guinness on the poster.
Jungle Cats and Brutal Bunnies
Regardless, Friday night we’ll tune in to Panthers and Rabbitohs at Penrith’s Whatever It’s Called Stadium (Pepper Stadium, a terrific name for a stadium) for the mighty rumble of black jungle cats and men who sold rabbits in the streets of Redfern in days of yore. And even without the cream of the Origin elite, this still shapes as a tasty burger.
Penrith – who are a game out of the Top-8 with a 7-7 win-loss record – have a backline, even without free-running fullback Matt Moylan, that’s beginning to resemble that which went so deep into 2014. Josh Mansour is chunky-hard, Dean Whare has soft hands and speed, and athletic custodian Dallin Watene Zelezniak does not need to buy any vowels. And their halves, Peter Wallace and Jamie Soward, were once considered good enough to play for New South Wales and probably aren’t far off it now. Penrith, they’re looking okay.
But the big Bunnies should win. Because their backs are probably just as good. And their forwards are mobile men-mountains, the best kind of men-mountains. George Burgess, Tom Burgess, Tim Grant, these people are more Humvee than man. Glenn Stewart’s back with his competitive steel and tricks, and John Sutton’s like a third half playing in the second-row. And with the Roosters and Bulldogs, Broncos and Cowboys, the Bunnies make up your old-fashioned top-five. The testing material.
Dragons to WIN
Dragons and Cowboys is your Saturday night game at WIN Stadium which is the name of the local regional television station and not a demand fans make of the home team, at least not so overtly. WIN you bastards, WIN!
A winner? Dragons, probably. The Cowboys have Ray Thompson at six, Robert Lui at seven and Jake Granville at nine. Lui is a fair player without being Johnathan Thurston the man whose number he takes; while Thompson is a hooker, normally, because he’s not as good a player as Michael Morgan. In the forwards the Cows have been if not emasculated then de-boned, losing Matt Scott and James Tamou to the Dance of the Big O.
The Dragons, meanwhile, lose only Josh Dugan and Trent Merrin, and with their star halves Gareth Widdop and Benji Marshall in sharp and happy form and bopping about behind a pack of forwards who make up a defensive dyke of human meat, they should win, the Dragons, and good luck to them.
Battle of Beaches
On Sunday at dear dilapidated Brookvale Oval there’s a Battle of the Beaches as the Northern Beaches sea birds take on visiting sharks from The Shire. The home side have finally hit some form and have their star halves, Kieran Foran and Daly Cherry-Evans on deck, along with star fullback Brett Stewart, star centre Steve Matai - whose hit on Dave Tyrell last week could ring the bells of St. Mary’s - and future star Tom Trbojevic on the wing. Nice mover, young Trbojevic, he’s 18 years old and the “best junior footballer I’ve ever seen,” according to North Sydney Bears prop Don McKinnon, an ’82 Kangaroo Tourist I play golf with occasionally – a man with really big hands.
The Sharks? Wouldn’t shout if a shark bit them. Yes they would, it was a grammatical ruse. Regardless, the Sharks will put up a pretty decent fight here. Their forwards, even without Paul Gallen are better than Manly’s, who have Willie Mason as their strike weapon, the game’s third oldest man.
But Manly at home playing well have an inevitability about them. And they’ll win. By 14 points.
Ma’u, Taupau and Sandow
And finally, Monday night’s fixture pits Parramatta Eels (6-9) and Wests Tigers (5-10) at a near-empty ANZ Stadium in a game that people even 72 hours before kick-off are hoping will just finish already so they can get jiggy with State of Origin.
It won’t be that bad. But poor old ANZ out Homebush way – without 50,000 in the joint it has the atmosphere of a decompression chamber in space.
It’s not that bad. And in fact the game could be pretty good. For when Martin Taupau runs at Manu Ma’u there will be great vengeance and furious anger. Keith Galloway only knows one direction at one speed. Former centre Chris Lawrence is running straight and tidy lines just off the ruck. And Ava Seumanufagai needs less vowels than DWZ. And he’s big as a house.
In the back division Luke Brooks and fast-twitching fullback James Tedesco have shown a combination with shades of Cronk and Slater, while Pat Richards (tenth-oldest NRL man) is playing well enough to itch the pants of armchair Origin selectors. Yay, Pat.
The Eels will rely rather a lot on Chris Sandow and nobody knows what Chris Sandow’s going to do, Chris Sandow included. Ahh, Chris Sandow. Chris Sandow.
So all that aside – State of Origin? Oh yes. A decider? In Brisbane? How about those for Batlow Delicious apples? Looking forward to it, and no argument. Never got to the old Lang Park, wish I had, it would’ve been grouse, that great noise and a close, colosseum feel. Yet Suncorp Stadium remains by a long chalk the best rectangular stadium in the sports-loving island continent of Australia, and full to bursting with “Queenslanders!”, well, this is sports-watching gold.
It does rather stuff with the National Rugby League, does State of Origin.
But you’ve got to love State of Origin.
