Queensland's triumph a victory over the dirty rats of Origin
- The Sunday Mail (Qld)
- July 10, 2011
- 113 comments
TRIUMPHANT: Maroons players celebrate their victory in the State of Origin decider at Suncorp Stadium last Wednesday. Picture: Mark Kolbe Source: Getty Images
ON Friday morning, I celebrated my 51st birthday at breakfast with a couple of friends at the cafe atop the Kangaroo Point cliffs in Brisbane.
As we ate, I took in the panoramic view of Brisbane's central business district beneath a clear winter sky and saw a city that reflected the Queensland State of Origin team.
Looking across the river to the gleaming buildings of the CBD, it was easy to forget that not so long ago this was a city with a broken heart.
Back in January, that same picturesque river did its best to bring Brisbane to its knees, delivering devastating floods that swamped parts of the city and that added to the agony of Queenslanders across the state in a summer of disaster.
But on Friday, I saw a city and a state that have emerged from their darkest hours to once again stand proud and successful.
Like the city of Brisbane, the Queensland team have managed to restore their glory despite the almost irresistible surge of forces beyond their control, through the commitment and pride of their people.
It was a victory against the very rats and filth that tried to poison a monumental team with lies, personal attacks, arrogance and disrespect.
What the Queensland team has been able to achieve in the past six years has been truly remarkable, something never achieved before at State of Origin level.
The only other comparable era of success would be that enjoyed by the great St George team, which won 11 premierships between 1956 and 1966.
But although the tremendous achievements of the great Dragons team are quite rightly celebrated by the game, it frustrates me that the unequalled success of this Maroons team is not similarly embraced.
Like that St George team of years gone by, this Queensland team has transformed mere men into immortals, and footballers into young men their community can be proud of.
But rather than be a cause for celebration, the Queensland team this year found itself the victim of a smear campaign so malicious and orchestrated that it tainted the entire code of rugby league.
And it came from the enemy within the game itself.
They are the faceless men of influence who claim their agenda is to benefit the game. Really, their only agenda is to benefit themselves.
For them, what Queensland has achieved in the past six years is detrimental to the health of the game.
Rather than celebrating the positive, by marvelling at the skill and achievements of a very special rugby league team - as with St George - they focus on "destroying a dynasty".
Let me tell you this for a start: no one in the Queensland camp uses the word dynasty. Dynasties are about personal glory. We are not interested in dynasties, we are concerned with leaving a legacy.
Legacies are about leaving the game in a better position than it was before. That is our goal, our mantra.
Regardless, the powerbrokers in NSW set about trying to destroy the system, the very same system they themselves copied for their own benefit.
No matter that the television ratings were at a record high. No matter that all three games were sold out.
They are the ones who dragged the spotlight off the game on the field and on to the judiciary with the citing of Johnathan Thurston, and who found five weeks' worth of difference in the identical tackles of David Taylor and Akuila Uate.
They are the ones who criticise Queensland's two closed training sessions as a refusal to promote the game, yet give their blessing to the NSW decision not to name its team until an hour before kick-off - the first time in Origin history.
They are the ones who have the hide to label Queensland - a team built on the twin pillars of respect and humility - arrogant in victory and whingers in defeat, but offer nothing when their captain places the loss of the series at the feet of the referees, instead of acknowledging superior opponents.
For them, the self-appointed keepers of the game, rugby league's health depended on NSW winning this year. That is what made me and others targets of personal attacks this year, conceived by puppets and driven by smarter people with their own interests at heart.
When the attacks were directed at individuals, myself among them, my initial reaction was to treat it like water off a duck's back.
But it was only a day or so later that it dawned on me what the powerbrokers were trying to achieve.
Rather than trying to unsettle or stress the individuals, what they were trying to do was rot the systems we have put in place for success from the inside out by planting a seed of doubt in the minds of the players and staff. I was one they chose to attack in a sinister and malicious manoeuvre to remove me from my job. It was a disregard and disrespect of what I have worked so hard and so proudly to achieve in my career as a player, and now as a coach, by attacking my reputation, integrity, credibility and abilities, by branding me a dispensable commodity, an easily replaced cog in a machine they controlled.
My achievements were reduced to mere collateral damage, "for the good of the game", nothing more than a tactic from a desperate team trying to win a game of football.
What they were doing was attacking, and trying to destroy my employment in a job that I love.
During the first few days in camp, I asked Major General Mick Slater, the head of the Queensland Government's Flood Recovery Taskforce, to speak to the players. Mick is an impressive and genuine man, who personally saw the devastation caused around the state earlier this year, and comforted those left heartbroken when their world turned on them.
Mick talked to the players about Queenslanders dealing with hard times and overcoming adversity. He spoke about why winning means less than the effort you put in, and how you carry yourself; about being gracious in defeat and humble in success. The players hung on his every word.
The Queensland team didn't face a flood or a cyclone on Wednesday night, but in the week leading up to the game they faced the sinister elements of a game that should be sheltering them. It was personal. It was malicious, and it was disgraceful.
I know the people who were behind it. I know their personal agendas. Some of them I had considered friends. I know I will never forget what they did.
They are the rats who, rather than celebrating a remarkable football team, tried to drown it with a flood of lies, half-truths and propaganda.
I think if Mick Slater had sat with me at breakfast on Friday, and reflected on the fighting qualities of this state and its football team, he would have joined me in being a very proud man.
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