July 6, 2025 • 43 mins
Queensland roll the dice for the decider — Shibasaki’s in, The Hammer shifts to fullback, and Big Papa returns! We break down every move, the Bellamy factor, and who wins Game 3 (and why).
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0:00-Coming Up
1:00-Decider
4:30-NSW
8:30-QLD & Shibasaki
15:00-Big Papa
18:00-Stefano
20:00-Craig bellamy
24:00-Wrestlers
26:30-Who Wins & How?
39:40-Munster & Dearden
42:00-Predictions
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yeah, gooday, guys, it's Maddie John's here. Look at as
you can tell on just not myself at the moment,
a little bit down, but tell it'll cheer me up.
Hitting the follow but on our podcast with the Family
podcast and backstage, so you don't miss any of the
good stuff we've got coming up. And thank you guys,
Thank you again for listening to the podcast and giving
us your support.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Good on you guys, and welcome back. It's begun. What
a big week it is State of Origin. Matthew're about
to do our preview. We have our review on Wednesday,
but I also wanted to look ahead just for a second.
We have Tim Zoo up next week letting people know
ahead of his big fight, as well as the week
after Friend of the Show Thomas Starling. So if you
(00:39):
haven't already likened, subscribe, leave a positive review, no negative stuff,
because without you guys listening, without you guys engaging, we
wouldn't be able to do this, this beautiful thing that
we call life in this podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
And two good guys coming up.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Tom Starling of course playing the best footballer his career
in a team that is top of the table. And
we'll finish in the top two and very well could.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
Win the premiership.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
And the other oneys you said before Tim Zuo against
Sebastian Fandora on the same card as many Pacquiao and
Mario Barrios, which is huge in July twenty So yeah,
a couple of big ones coming up and look.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Forward to it coops.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Correct. But let's not focus too far ahead because right
now in the present state of Origin, Game three a
very much anticipated game, A big decider in Sydney last
year it was at Suncourt, Queensland Territory. This year in
New South Wales. Have you played in any deciders and
if so, where was it.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
I only played four Origin games, but yeah, one of
them my last Origin game was a decider eight at
the City Football Stadium. That was a game that I
had the worst preparation I've spoken about before because I
was I was dropped. I was, I was unsurprising dropped.
After game one, I was barely used. I played about
fifteen minutes off the bench and I was surplus to requirements.
Speaker 3 (01:53):
So I got dropped.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
And then that was a mixed that was a split round.
So me and a few of the Castle boys who
went out and had a merle had about half a dozen,
maybe a dozen beers, and then I woke up. And
then I got tipped off that night too. It was
crooked then. And got a call from the morning and said, mate,
you were in get down here, you're playing hooker. Went
to the airport. There was no there was no ticket
(02:17):
for me. I went to buy a ticket. There were
no seats on the plane. Luckily the pilot went past
and I was sitting on the floor in the cockpit
between the two pilots. Got down there late for the game.
I got there for the game, but late in preparations.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Just a jump because I've heard this story a few
times and it's actually I never actually picked up. That
was on game day right, So like they they asked
you to fly the day of the game. This wasn't
for Captain John right, this is on the Wednesday.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
No, this is I went down, I landed, and then
a few hours later I'm on the way to the
sitting football standing to play and Cooper. Of all the
origins I played them, it was a low bar as
far as how I played, But that was the best
game I played. I played hooker. Firstly, for two reasons.
I reckon, I'd play my best origin game. I think
about it too much. Just went out there and played.
And secondly, playing hooker. Like playing playing hooker, it was
(03:08):
so much easier than playing in the halves. Really, I
mean harder physically, but you don't have to steal anyone
around the park. All I could do is make sure
I made men tackles, you know, give good service out
of dummyhalf. And there was one mark Lane on the
ground scoot. Very simple, simple things to worry about as
opposed to having to corrolling the whole team.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
But it is it's a different fitness, right, Like I
imagine the lungs would have been burning.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Well. I played about twelve.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Months of hooker coop coming through the grades when I
was younger, and so you sort.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Of get used to it.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Yeah, oh it's totally different, totally different fitness, but there's
a different feel in the decider. When got to the
ground ran on, there was just and the nature of
the contest it was more intense.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Yeah, well was there a lot more? What was the crowd?
What do you remember from the house?
Speaker 1 (03:52):
Full house, a full house, Sitney Football Stadium forty zero.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
How did that compare to like a let's say a
ninety seven Grand Final crowd, because that was that at
Sydney Football State and City Football State.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
I think the biggest crowd ever at Sydney Football Stadium
was Grand Final, that ninety seven Grand Final.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
But different, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
It's just a very different, very different atmosphere, very very
different feeling. As proud as you are representing New South Wales,
there's something very special about playing a Grand Final with
your tribe.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah, and I imagine like the tribe that you grew
up with, right, it'll be like the Travrovich brothers running
out for a Grand Final, like imagine a quite emotional fine.
Not that they will get that this year.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
No, just no pressure on them.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
You look at what's happening in Israel, in the Ukraine,
you know, no pressure exactly. The other thing, mate, you're
going to die. You're going to die eventually. Work backwards
from that, good perspective.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Yeah, but let's go through some of the teams. Let's
start with New South Wales because they had no changes, right,
there was a lot of speculation that they were going
to drop the chef Stefano.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
Bring in chef, bring in Keyon. Yeah, that was looked
like it was going to be likely. But for anyone
that knows Laurie Daily, there's no surprise that he's stuck, loyal.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
And did you like that if you were coaching, how
do you like that decision?
Speaker 1 (05:15):
As far as if I was coaching, I don't know.
I would have been tempted to bring keyon in. But
I'm actually once the decision was made to keep Stefana,
I'm actually really happy with it. I'm happy for him.
There's far too much in New South Wales in the
last four or five years. Just pick a blake, drop
a blake, bring him in, get rid of him.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
And I think you look at that game as well,
like New South Wales did not come out of the
blocks hard and by the time, like Stefano was on
the back foot a lot of the time, that Queensland
pack was so up for it. It's very hard to judge.
You know, you put him in that game. One performance,
he might go out there and blitz them like pain hasted,
But that game too was very hard for someone through
the middle to actually have an impact. A Queensland was
(05:52):
so up for it emotionally.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Right, and and the other one you're spot on and
The other one is it takes a player time to
get used to stef of Origin. Like I just said,
in my last Origin game, I Reckon, I finally sort
of got the hang of really what it was about
and what you needed to do. So Stefano every game
he'll play, he'll play, he'll get better. And if you
drop Blakes, you just lose them. Well, you lose them
(06:14):
if you know, particularly Blakes are unfairly dropped.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
You know, it's very hard to pick him again.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
Because they just lose, They lose faith and trust in
the whole process.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, yeah, Stefano is a I met him a few times. Actually,
Steph terrific bloke. He's a lovely kid mate, one of
the one of the most humble blokes I reckon I've
met out so particularly he you know, he played Origin
by the time he'd already gone to Melbourne. He played
one game under Matge. But he's just such a humble bloke,
the boys say as well. He rips in a training
(06:45):
like he just works so hard for a big man,
always wanting to learn. So it's good to see Steph
back in the side.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Fantastic.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Yeah, yeah, you're really really happy for him, and you
can see the more he plays at the Melbourne Storm,
you see h bit by bit getting better. He's do
a lot more off like now. He's probably get more
and more comfortable there. So yeah, he looks well unsurprisingly
when you go to Melbourne.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
I don't know if you've ever been there.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
I was there. I was there, I was I was there.
I played there for about five years. Mate, you did
you did?
Speaker 3 (07:17):
You did?
Speaker 1 (07:18):
I mean the big story Coup is, it's the corns Lantern.
You've got to respect Billy Slater from this because Billy's
willingness to take some big selection gambles, even if it
means changing winning sight and basically and possibly getting hammered
afterwards because of it, heavy criticism in the pursuit of
(07:42):
following his gut.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
Feel is really to be admired.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
And when Caylen was injured with Liz Frank and they
needed to fullback, given the very fact Coup two reasons
I thought recently picked was because Billy has never been
backwards in his admiration for Reese and and the second
one was that if you were going to move Hammer
back to full back, you had to find another center.
(08:06):
Now probably the position that they lack the most depth
in is center coup given like young Robert Toy has been.
He was picked on the right center position and only
after a few first grade games. And so for that reason,
I thought it myself, none and he'll keep he'll keep
Hammer in the centers, and he'll he'll put recent fullback.
But Hammer's in better form, and he decided to put
(08:29):
Hammer back there and go right.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
I've got to.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
Find myself another one. He's gone with Shibasaki.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
It is interesting because like somebody, particularly Slatsy, who has
been under someone like Craig Bellamy for a long time.
Bells big thing was always like, you don't want to
weaken another position to strengthen another position, if that makes sense,
Like you don't want too much rearranging going on.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
By putting Hammer, who was on the wing in game two,
to full back, it now looks like they're going to
have to move Valentine Holmes to the right wing to
then bring Gamut Shibasaki on the to left center. So
there is a lot of changing of combinations. You've got
to move the bloke who did a good job at
left center val over to the right wing, hawing a
fullback a debutae at left center marking Stephen Crichton, which
(09:11):
is possibly one of the biggest jobs on the field.
So yeah, it shocked me too that it wasn't just
a you know, bring recent and then you get to
keep all the other pieces the exact same, Yeah, which
is unusual for somebody who you know, has done a
lot of his learning under Craig. But I mean, I
actually like what he's when I look at the side now,
I do like what he's done because it's an inform
(09:34):
side like Gamba ship Osaki. He's been in terrific form
for a Broncos side that's been quite inconsistent.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
It's a very much a feel good story coup.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
If he goes out.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
There and brains it's a fairytale story given the fact
that we gamutt. He has played forty five NRL games
since twenty eighteen. So twenty eighteen he's gone, He's gone, Broncos, Knights, Cowboys,
South Sydney.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
No, No, not so he went. He went, so after
nights he went to Japanese rugby, yes, and then he
come back to the Cowboys and then went to Townsville
Blackhawks and just played there yep.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
And then he had had two games at South, did
he Yep? And he had a couple couple of games
at South, then went back to the Broncos and as
she said, stint Japanese rugby in between and every club
he's been at, it's only been a very short stint
and they've allowed him to go. So for him to
arrive this year, and Mad's has had a fair bit
of criticism this year about training too high, but the
(10:33):
proofs and the budding there with him. Yeah, yeah, like
how good he's playing.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
And he was a boom junior. A lot of people
probably don't was he know that? Yeah? I know he played.
He played under like eighteen's under twenties origin with the
likes of like AJ Brimson, Harry Grant was in that
side as well, and they all raved about him, saying
how good he was coming through juniors, juniors and then yeah,
for whatever reason when he first sort of come into
first grade, found couldn't find his feet a little bit.
(10:58):
I know that Broncos side he first come into, they
were really struggled like that.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
I think that was a awfully awful time to go
into the Broncos.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Yeah, you saw a lot of blokes kind of fall
it like Xavier Coats kind of came in and out
of that side. A lot of blokes struggled with consistency.
But it's good to see him going good.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
It's interesting that you say that because Coops, when when
tom didn't first went to the Cowboys, and of course
tom didn't had about three years of the Broncos pull
bugger in that the worst possible time. Spoke to when
we're trying to unlock the reason why why did ship
of sarchy bounce around? Never could find you really get
any traction. Talking to Todd Peyton after Tommy did In's
(11:35):
first year at the Cowboys, and he said, I said, what,
given what he'd endured at the Broncos, tell me what,
how did tom didn't turn up? He said, mate, he
was a nervous wreck. He said, he just picked his
nails at training, he said, he said he just felt
that sorry for him, and bit by bit, you know
that they they's got that out of him, or they
(11:57):
drew some confidence out of him, or injected some confidence
and he is able to be the player that you
know that everyone us was in there somewhere, but he
was just traumatized by the whole Broncos experience might have
been the same with Shibasaki. As I said before, it's
it's a feel good story. It could be a fairy tale,
but it's.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
An enormous risk. Now if we're going to talk.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
About in the cold, hard, late light of day, it's
an enormous risk because what you've got on the edge,
the center is a position where you'd get one on
one battle. Still, not a lot of positions on the
field you do, but the center is one that you
definitely do. So they've got Robert Toyer and Shubasaki against
Latrell and Stephen Crichton.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
Now that those.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Two players, as far as experience in high pressure football,
are not even in the same postcode, not even the
same country. So that's the extent of the risk that
Billy is taken.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
Jack actually played with Gat I believe as well.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
Yeah, play with them in Newcastle twenty twenty one. He
good fella too, gammutt he Yeah. He struggled a bit
through twenty twenty one. He debuted at the nights, he
debuted Broncos I think the year before, and then he
played a handful of games I think maybe half the
year or so, and finals for the Knights in twenty
twenty and then twenty twenty one. Yeah, he just sort
(13:20):
of struggled a bit and struggled to get back into contention.
What's he like as a blow Oh champion fella great,
great blow good honest, real happy bloke. But it was
really hard for him to because he's in the top thirty.
I'm pretty sure in twenty twenty one he didn't even
get brought up to the COVID bubble. I think they
just they left him. He then from there went to
Japanese rugby because he's a Japanese passport.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
That's right, he has a Japanese passport.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Shibasaki is very much he sounds like a Japanese name,
so yeah, interesting one of his mum where his dad
got Japanese Japanese which had his facial hair, because because
it must be he might it must be either his
dad his month, because Japanese passport is probably the hardest
pass to get in the world.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
Yeah, that's right, Because isn't there that old story about
Hugh Jackman.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
Hugh Jackman, Gus told me Gus Warland, who's best mate
when he goes When Jacko goes to Japan, they absolutely
go nuts because you know they love, yeah, the Wolverine,
they love the cartoons sort.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
But he also filmed that one of the Wolverines was
based out of Japan's Oh was it? Yeah, there was
that one where he fought like the Japanese samurai.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
Right, So Jacko goes there a fair bit and enjoys
amazing popularity there.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
Remember that. Gus told us the story.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
There and I was going to say Japanese restaurant in Japan,
but of course it is. It was in a restaurant
in Japan, and he had a hat on and one
person just pegning, and he said, within fifteen minutes there
were two thousand sorry spotted him. Yeah, and within fifteen
minutes there were two thousand people out the front of
(14:52):
the sushi restaurant just chanting for him to come out.
But yeah, he loved the He loves the country so
much so he actually inquired with it, the Japanese passport,
and they took offense.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Wow. Yeah, So what's the why why do they take
offense to that? Is that just because they.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Of all the countries in the world, no one tries,
no one, no one preserves.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
Their culture like Japan. They like to keep it very Japanese.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
It's it's yeah, and that dates that dates way way
back from the from the old days of the Christian
missionaries and everything. What happened with Savance Xavier went in.
But that's a whole different story.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Let's not go there now.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
We're talking state of origin.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
That is true. We get side sometimes. What about the
other big inclusion, Big Josh Papa Lee out of retirement
back into the Queensland side. How did you love that?
Speaker 1 (15:35):
Well, this is a this is another bombshell, but it's
not a big risk in my opinion.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
It's not a big gamble.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
This is but well, he's you know, he's dropped mofod
a waker from a winning side of the Golden Rule again.
Billy's gone no, no, If I my gut feel is
we need something, I'm going to make the change again.
I admire him for that Big Papa's He's brought. From
my understanding. I was talking to Cooper Krong. Billy has
had this up his sleeve for a couple of series
(16:02):
and this was the one. Okay, I'm going to produce
the ace right now. And because they're going to need
something cooped for for Queensland to beat New South Wales
in a just sider in Sydney. Given the team we had,
they're gonna need something special. They're gonna He's brought him
in for a big lift in inspiration, big lift in
(16:22):
emotion and it's a it's a good story. It's a
little bit like it's a little bit like alf you know,
Alan Langer retire returning that time from England. I mean
not to that extent, but it's a big one. If
you look at the pack, I mean Tina Carrigan, Papa,
you know you've got Kirk Caate well in the back
(16:43):
round as well. He's it's a formidable pack now beefs
it up.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
And when you talk to the Canberra boys like obviously
Tommy Starling and Zach Hosking, we have a lot to
do with talking to those lads what Josh property brings
in the ships and emotionally to a team like they
all love him so much and they all admire him
and he brings the best out in other players. And
(17:09):
even when I remember when Munster used to come back
from State of Origin he played with Papa before he
retired from the State of Origin arena, but he'd come
back and rave about Big Papa in there, like having
somebody because they haven't really had a player in that
Queensland camp probably the last two games. Who the young
crop look at and go like, I was watching this
(17:29):
guy play Stut of Origin and you know, play for
the Raiders when I was fifteen sixteen, Like he's been
around for a long time. You don't realize how many
games and how old he is.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
Regan Tina.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Papa would be one of Tueno's heroes. Yea, so Tino
would be just pinched himself, can't mate right, And for
people who don't understand that, it's not just watching admiring
a hero playing, it's actually those players trying to impress
their heroes, going above and beyond to say, I'm playing
alongside this guy going to I'm going to show him unworthy.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
It makes it and even and that's not even in
the game. That's like all week of training, Like that's
having a bloke there like that what it the intensity
that it brings to the training session because as you know, Matthew,
when even when when even when your head coach he
might your head coach might be sick for a week
and you have the assistant there, the intensity the training load.
Nothing drops, but the intensity drops two percent of each
(18:23):
of the players because you haven't got that presence of
the leader there, who's who's sort of he doesn't have
to say anything, but him being there brings everyone up. Yeah,
it's the same with players, like when players go out
to go play State of Origin. I have no doubt
that the training sessions at club Land they drop in
intensity a little bit because those key players leave. Josh
(18:43):
Papa is going to bring.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
That, Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
And he went in the camp a few days later
than everybody else because he's of course his wife had
a newborn son. It's fantastic, so so Billy allowed him
to stay with the family for a few extra days.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
And Stefano also arrived, Like did you read so he
missed his flight, David, which is like, imagine that, right,
your your Stefano and there's reports that you might lose
your position. They stick and he goes bloody oth, I'm
going to go into training, I'm going to rip in
all week. I'm going to go out there and play
an awesome game. The first job you have is to
(19:17):
make sure you get on the flight at the right time.
Apparently he read the boarding time or the departure time
as the boarding time. So he's obviously thought that's an
hour later, and he's in the taxi out there on
the way and he looks down and realizes that like
it's boarding. As he's driving out, he had to ring
Frank Penisy Frankie Vanisi and go, sorry, Frank, I'm not
(19:39):
going to make my fly. God, oh mate.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
That would be didn't send him the flight details?
Speaker 2 (19:44):
No, probably, but mate, that is the most thaying that
you would have been. He'd be wigging out so bad.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
Be awful.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
So coops, this series, you've gone into camp, what's belly
ach like, what's his demeanor as part of the coaching staff.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
Compared to what he's like at Melbourne? Is is like?
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Did you find him intense as focused?
Speaker 2 (20:10):
You know what? Like even chatted a few of the boys,
like we had Presto and kind of Watson come on
the potty and they sort of spoke about how he
doesn't really do much video. He's just sort of sits
back and lets him do the thing. When I was
at the training session in camp in there very much
the same like I will. He was just sort of
standing over the side, just sort of watching the training
session on his own, and then I was going up
(20:31):
and yarnen to him while he was watching. It was lighthearted,
as I don't think he's putting too much. I don't
think he's riding like he obviously rides that club emotion.
But the strength of belly, which probably a lot of
people don't understand, is how observing he is. Like he's
not technically, he's not going to sit there and go
this is you know, do this and that with all
the shapes and stuff, but he is so observant of
(20:54):
players and like he sees things that no other coach
or person really noticed. I remember we go in after
a loss and we would sit there in video and go, oh,
he's going to talk about, you know, us missing this
tackle that led to this tribe stuff. But he would
notice things from three sets before or four tackles before,
(21:14):
and go, this is what we did wrong that led
to and this. You can see the effect of how
this happened two plays later because we weren't able to
contain that it gave them the advantage which then led
to this and which is such a powerful because it
educates players so well and going okay, me missing the
tackle there. That wasn't actually that that was you know,
(21:35):
I can try to make that, but I can make
it easier on ourselves by us doing this throughout the set.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Throw a pebble in a pond, and what happens. The
reverberations go out, you know, you see the reverberations just
go from the pebble in the pond. That's what it's
like you're talking about there where you go, a reverberation happens,
you know, way over there, but it was a result
of the pebble hitting the pot way back here.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Yeah, the yeah, yeah, it's it's he's so so intelligent
like that. So I've his role kind of sits like that.
I believe where he sits back and he will just
kind of come in when he sees when he notices
something that no one else notices that you know, it
might be a slipping complacency, it might be a lack
of effort. He's really good at pointing out effort stuff
(22:22):
that no one else notices. He will chime in there
and tell He'll tell Loz or you'll tell someone else
in presence.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
Yeah, they beat one eye on him the whole time.
And you're talking about players from other clubs going there.
Craig Bellamy's on the sideline like they'd be working hard
to impress him.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
You know, it was interesting. Remember when we had Presto
on it. He was like, you know it Craig Bellamy,
like and he didn't have too much to say to me.
You just come up and said this thing. But like
the whole time, I'm going like, shit, that's Craig Bellamy.
You just sometimes forget, like I suppose, like when Eve,
when you've been coached by a certain player, with a
certain coach or whatever, you don't realize how much presence
(22:58):
they actually have and how other players at other clubs
actually still idolize them.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
Okay, talking about like you, we've spoken about Craig Bellamy. Okay,
Over into the other bunker, you've got the Coueensland blokes
and Harry Grant's been there for a number series number serious.
But you spard to Trent Ero a little bit. Trent
is new and so he's going in as a fresh
set of eyes. What does he said about some of
(23:23):
the players.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Yeah, I caught up with them after game the day
after Game two actually for a coffee over in the
Eastern suburbs.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Mate.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
You know what was funny that Trent said, Actually he
goes leading into a good insight into someone like Kurk Kate. Well, right,
we spoke about how good he played Game two. So
he was wrestling with kirk Kate. Well, the five minutes
before they were about to go warm up. You get
a partner in your pummel and you wrestle just to
warm up your shoulders. He said he has never wrestled
(23:52):
someone so strong in his life.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
Yeah, he was like, so there's some players ja Ja
Vrovich is the same Tom Eisenhuth who just retired on
the Dragons and we played together at Melbourne. He was
possibly the strongest player I've ever come up against.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
So wow, that wiry strength.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
It's a group strength that like they can throw, like
they're not strong in the weight room, but when they
get their hands on you, they could suffocate. They're like
a python, they can suffocate up camera.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
Smith probably would have been the same.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
That sort of great Cameron Smith. I'll get the funny
Smith story actually in the second. But yeah, Trent said
when he was wrestling with Kirk Kate, well, he was like,
it was actually getting me angry. How strong he was
because I felt like it actually, yeah, it made me
feel like it made me feel weak. I'm a veg
man and I'm about to run out into a start
(24:38):
like my first starting role playing State of Origin game two,
a must win game, and Kirk kate Well's making him
feel weak.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
He's a veag man.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Go over to camera Smith for a second, right, So
Smithy was like no one ever beat Smithy on knee wrestling,
so letting people know you dropped your knees and you
kind of fight for to get the other player to
the ground. He was really like strong in that sense,
like so strong around the hips and core. And the
only person that I ever saw take it too far
(25:09):
was Smithy. And in ground wrestling with shandor Or earl
our Man, Shandor took upon himself. He gets very competitive.
He didn't want to lose to him. And we were
sitting on the side because forwards would go forwards and
bigger players would go together first and the backs would
sit back, and we were genough Shanna going, you're not
going to beat smith You're not going to beat smith.
He put him in a reen naked choke hold and
started choking him out. Like to the point where it
(25:32):
was like, you're not going to choke out the captain
and Cameron smith and Smithy started just like hitting him
in the head while it was that funny and we're
going shandle let him go. And then like the rest
of us came and Shanda no choking out? What are
you doing?
Speaker 1 (25:46):
And she was like, oh, I thought, like win it
all Cross, I'm going to choke out the mortal yeahah,
tell the Green kids.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
It was so funny, you're so strong.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
Let's have a talk about coop.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
Someone talk about it, like, Okay, probably we have a
blues bias. We try, you know, we our thing is
that we try to lower our guns as far as
you know, being pure blues and yeah, whatnot for the
sake of having a fair and reasonable discussion about the game.
But we have talked about the things that are just
really crucial, some of the things that New South Wales
(26:17):
really need to do to make sure they win this
sider Yeah well New.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
South Well, I was in the box seat right, like
we've said it since game one. They're display that game
one and it leads into Queensland's narrative. But our side
on paper is one of one of the most talented sides.
We saw a game one. We even saw it second
half in Game two where you're down twenty four points
but they come back and rally and nearly win, like
(26:43):
nearly win to the point where you go one of
the best comebacks in Origin history. We are in the
box seat if we go out there and play well
to wrap up this series.
Speaker 3 (26:52):
Right.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
It's a classic narrative, it is, and Game two was
the classic result to the classic narrative.
Speaker 3 (26:58):
It will be careful. Yeah, we got to be careful coops.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
The first thing we've got to do, and it's a
no brainer, is discipline. Discipline is imperative for New South Wales.
Our discipline was terrible. Forget about all this talk about
ref bias and the penalty count. The reason we get
we got belt in the penalty count was our discipline
is so bad. Our ball security, which is part of
(27:23):
the discipline, was really bad. Hence the reason why we're
going at half time and we're down by such a large,
large martial margin. It was self inflicted wounds the second half,
which really should give them a lot of confidence if
we can get the discipline right. Is the fact that
when they finally got their focus in their heads.
Speaker 3 (27:42):
Right.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
You know, we nearly instigated a comeback for the Ages
to come from behind victory, perilously close from one of
those come back from behind victories. But discipline, discipline, if
we if we do have one thing we can do
in this game, if we are disciplined, our discipline is outstanding.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
Not a doubt in the world, we win.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
From a players perspective, right, I want to ask you
this question because I know my answer, but I want
to get you when you look at game two and
you look at how much defense and how hard New
South Wales made it for himself based on the penalty count,
based on errors, you know, kicking out in the full,
they do a lot of defense. When you look, do
(28:25):
you take confidence out of that coming into camp right now?
If you're the half fact at you sit there and
you go look at how hard we made this game
too for ourselves and we nearly won it. We nearly
came back and wont it given how much fuel we
burned that first half and how undisciplined we were. How
much confidence does that give you coming into game three?
Speaker 1 (28:47):
Two things coop as long as you establish the reason
why you were so ill disciplined. There's always a reason.
When you pull the sheets back, you sometimes can find
something like, you know what, boys, if you have a
look l last training session, we're a little bit or whatever,
or what about this, or maybe tactically we tried to
do this too much. Let's pull back here and push
(29:08):
our energies more there. If you can identify that gives
you a lot of confidence. Secondly, you've got to be
very very careful that something so which appears basic coop,
which really appears basic, and which is blatantly so obvious,
doesn't lead you down to the road of complacency.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (29:32):
We're you just go in there and say, hey, boys,
look at all the errors, look at this and look
at that. Boys, we just got to fix it up't
we win? It's not that simple, you know. The old
discipline is a byproduct sometimes of not quite having your
heads on, having a little bit of complacency there and
which New South Wales the game two is a classic.
It's another example of why there aren't there are very
(29:53):
few clean sweeps. It's because Queensland were just desperate. There
was not an out of complacency. You know, they're coming
off a win, they had to win, and we had
a little bit of a buffer. You know, it wasn't
absolutely crucial that we win, which led to just us
being a little off as far as desperation, and that's
part of that. That was one of the things that
led to our ill disciplined. That was a factor. So
(30:15):
we've just got to be careful. We've got to be
on top of those things. Yeah, okay, second one, really
obviously we just need Nathan to be as close as
he can to be one hundred percent fit, not going
to be one hundred percent fit, but close enough they
can actually do control all our.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
Aspects of our kicking. That was that was that.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
I think Nathan not not being able to really control
all those aspects of his kicking and use his array
of kicks was almost as big a factor as our discipline.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Do you do you think because he's growing obviously he
didn't kick for Penrith last week when he was goal kicking,
do you still think that if you were Nathan like
coming that same tactic coming sort of fifty in mainly
the shorter attacking kicks can take control of But would
you still want you are you saying you'd want him
(31:03):
to do the longer.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
I want him doing the longer kicking. I want him.
I want him.
Speaker 1 (31:07):
If he's able to doing the long kicking, the short kicking, ticking,
all the kicking, I don't I don't care if he
doesn't goal kick, yeah right, if he believes that there's
one sort of area that needs to pull back on
a little, just preserve, I'd be more than happy to
let Crichton or Lomax do the goal kicking. And I'll
(31:27):
be tempted to just push that ahead anyway and just
say no, Nathan, we can let him do the kicking, mate,
Because brother, when we get fifty out, I need you
to put some of those dead ball bombs up, things
like we have to think about this, remove everyone else
from the game, Nathan Cleary versus the hammer.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Think about that.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
And when Nathan is able to execute all his array
of kicks, it's a nightmare for the fallback.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
You know he can.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
You know, Nathan with his kicking game, he creates tries,
he gets repeat sets, He allows his team to dominate
territorial and in that and in turn, he builds pressure.
He puts enormous pressure on their opposition full back. If
he isn't able to do the majority of our kicking
or able to kick as well as he could. Then
you know that brings you know that gives just slither
(32:17):
of hope isn't the right word, but it can bring
the hammer into the game, our long kicking game. Nathan
needs to kick for his long kicking needs to keep great,
and our key chase.
Speaker 3 (32:25):
Has got to be even better.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
So Nathan, you know that that's that that's a crucial
factors as crucial as our discipline.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Yeah, yeah, and that's and there's no it's no surprise
how important is when we saw game two, the lack
of our start came back to Nathan not being able
to control that kicking game because you saw Drome kick
the first one out in the.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
Fall yep Okay, next thing we need to do and
we did it. We didn't do it enough in game two.
Whenever we did something happen tries or breaks or easy meters.
We got to get Latrelle and Stephen Crichton clean, fast.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
Early ball.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
And and there's a few reasons here. The big one
is the fact that again sub of Psaki and Toya
against Latrelle and Stephen Crichton, we don't. What we've got
to be conscious of here is we don't need to
do really elaborate sets of six or elaborate attacking players
(33:26):
and sequences to create a numerical advantage for those outside men.
You know, you just want to just get to the ball,
ping ping, get just getting fast early cleaning ball, get
them one on one with those opposition player. And you know,
if you think early in the game, if you're sub
of Psarki and the ball goes you know, to Crichton
and he goes Bush and he pushes off first, Like,
(33:47):
you know, what does that do to your conference? You
want in those early touches. You want Latrell and you
want Stephen Crichton having time and space opposite those, you know,
those inexperienced origin players to try to just dent their
confidence a little bit.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
What it also doesn't look whether it makes Toya or
ship Asaki's their confidence. But what it does to your
wingers too, Xavier Coats and Valentine Holmes, and you saw
it a few times in Game two where if you
don't trust your center inside you, you feel obliged to
come out and jam outside in and try to land
on them. But the beauty of Crichton and Latrell is
their quick hands. You know you saw Game one, that
(34:26):
beautiful quick hands from Latrell because the winger thought I'm
going to come out and land on because he didn't
trust his center.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Okay, Coop, that's going to bring me to the next point.
That's a that's a good in for me. Is that
you got to think about this.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Slater is going to go to Toya and Shibasaki. He's
going to say, fellas, we've got to get off the
line fast and we've got a pressure and get in
their face. So if if I'm Laurie, I'm telling Nathan,
and I'm telling Isaiah and Jerome Leway, I'm saying, boys,
very how far you take the.
Speaker 3 (34:58):
Ball into the defense. If you go bang it.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
Like and you do what a ballplayer should do and
take it all the way into the cold face to
your target defender, then you're giving the opportunity for sub
with Psaki and Toya to snuff our center outside in.
So I'd be encouraging to say, hey, boys, sometimes take
it all the way the line to try to strip
shorter numbers, but other times take one step and then
(35:24):
let it go and you're going to catch them in
no man's land if that means, because I think at
times Toyaba p SSARCHI are going to pre empt outside in.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
Yeah, well it worked for him Game two. I think
that was a clear plan. They came in. They wanted
to go and jam Dylan Edwards out the back of
shape so that he couldn't get early ball to Cryton
on the trail. And then you saw that second half
they started to create some variations where they played a
little bit earlier, or they tunnel balled it, which is
firing it straight to the center so that straight through
so they can't jam on them. So I imagine that they'll
(35:56):
have a bit of a plan around that jamming.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
Critteral literally got to help their heart as well. Those
those two blokes are so good. I don't want them
just in their ten minute corridor. I mean, look at
Turbo the other night for manly switching having the intelligence
to look and go nothing really on here. I want
to switch to the other side. And you think about this,
you think about Latrelle coming to the other side and
him and Crichton working in combination. I mean the mismatch
(36:21):
that creates Yeah, I want to see I want to
see him do more of that. In fact, I can't
believe more clubs don't do it, you know, trusting that
there's a lot of smart centers out there that can
clearly look up and see the ball coming across and
nothing's going to be an offe you'll want to switch
to the long side.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Yeah, it is weird that clubs probably don't do that
as much anymore. I think they like to have their
structure control. Yeah yeah, but there's times when you can
have your controlled structure and then giving your smart, creative
outside backs, whether it's a winger or center, licensed to
do that. Turbo is good because he has footy instincts
of a halfback yep, and he can if he knows
(36:59):
when he's got to stay there, and then he knows
when the ball's going over that way you can go.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
It opens a whole Pandora's box as well as far
as the opposition and how they react to it. Because
back in the day Coup, if I'm a center on
the left side and I'm marking Malmaninger a malmoninger, all
of a sudden, the ball's coming over here and there's
a play the ball and he switches. Guess what uster switches, well,
i'd have to switch as well.
Speaker 3 (37:23):
He creates, so.
Speaker 1 (37:24):
You're not creating that mismatch. It's not as as vital
these days as it was in the eighties and seventies,
simply because our each back roll is so athletic. Yeah,
but still it would just be interesting to see how
a defense would.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
React to these days. Now. I've been in games where
there has been centers that used to switch over. Coriots
used to do it a bit for the Broncos. He'd
switch from the wing and go and float over the
left side when we played against him. And now the
plan always is in the modern day game is the
winger just communicates he's when he sees the winger, all
the center go. The winger would yell out, and then
(37:59):
they put They pushed the back roller over to the
open side. They don't really follow them anymore, just because
they'd like to keep everyone in there. Certain defensive of course, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
But the other one, the other one Cook we've got
to do is we have to be willing queens.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
Queens the't going to be right up for physically.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
They're going to kick long into the corners and they're
kind of try to jam us game two. Unsurprisingly, after
what we did to them with our yardage and game
in game one, they push enormous amount of energy, defensive
energy into stopping plays one, two and three Edwards zak Lomax,
and we didn't sort of there was once down the
right side we gave the ball, went one to really
(38:41):
simple three passes to Stephen Crichton, who took twenty meters.
Speaker 3 (38:44):
We've got to be able to do that.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
They're going to they're going to kick along to us,
they're going to tighten and they're going to.
Speaker 3 (38:49):
Try to rush.
Speaker 1 (38:50):
If they do that, we don't need to try to
be fancy. It's just one to three passes. Take the
easy meters. They're daring you, come on, push the ball
of the edges. Come on, take a risk. We'll lander
risk if you do. It's simple one, two, three, take
twenty meters, play the ball, then start going forward.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
Yeah, if you don't think about scoring a try or
going around a team off it. If you have the
mentality of I'm just running to get tackled in twenty meters,
it's pretty safe. It's a pretty should.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
We have a predictions, a couple of there's just another
thing I want to speak about here, and this is
this is massive for New South Wales. It's a huge one.
Is Munster and Tom didn't, but particularly Camera Monster in
the Camera Monster era, Queensland have been very, very difficult
(39:41):
to beat when they have a run first past second mentality.
When Monster runs the ball, things things happen. So it's
very easy to say, I don't let him run the ball.
We don't have control of that. What's so important though,
is for Munster we do not present visual opportunity. Our
defense is set, you know, or a set as it
(40:02):
can be sometimes too quick play the ball, but basically,
don't show in space. You don't have your space is wrong,
have your space is perfect, and have blokes they're sitting
there nominating Monster. So when Monster looks up, he doesn't
recognize visual opportunity. If he wants to run the ball,
he's going to have to do it through blind faith,
because the moment he spots that someone looks a little tired. Here,
(40:24):
he's a little bit of space, a little bit disjointed.
They're not coming off their line quick enough, he'll go.
So prevention is better than the cure. The other one
is Tom did and Tom didn't, doesn't stop. He just
goes all the time, and his trademark is showing go.
They can't be conned into one of his dummies. No
dummies off dead and the third ones you'll mate, Harry
grant Is. I've spoken about discipline before having I will
(40:48):
say this, be willing here and there during the game
to give a six tackle repeats, set away if it
means controlling Harry, slowly, play the balls, get your markers set.
If he regularly gets out of dummy half, we're in trouble.
Speaker 2 (41:06):
Yeah, particularly inside your own Yeah, you know your own
try line. You're trying to defend it. You saw how
effective he was in game two when he gets out
and you know his halves are pushing off him. But
like you said with did and show and go, not
presenting those trying to present a straight line, so he
doesn't have any visual cues where he knows he needs
to run or when you're out there in the in
(41:27):
the washing machine, and it is it's a hard discs.
Speaker 1 (41:31):
It's just got to be hard and fast rule. You know,
even if they've got a little advantage on you, don't
don't be tempted to try to protect the three on
two on the outside. No dummies, Yeah, no dummies. Let
the outside men solve it.
Speaker 2 (41:43):
Who wins math.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
New South Wales win and we get our discipline right.
I think we win a twenty eight eight. I'm going
to go man of the match Nathan Cleary. So injury
hasn't allowed him to really dominate the series like we
thought he was going to be able to. If he's fit,
(42:05):
I think this could be the game.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
I'm with you on that. I had coins in game two,
but I I feel New south Wales are just too
They're too good a side. I think I think they'll
have their head screwed on given the first half a
Game two. I've got New South Wales and I've got
them twenty two to twelve nice, and I have my
man of the match. I don't have Nathan Clear. I'm
(42:28):
trying to think who I've got. You know I've got.
I'm thinking maybe a paying hass again, paying hass games
Game one and three don't go broke back in pain?
Speaker 1 (42:36):
Yeah mate, it's You're not wrong, Isaiah.
Speaker 3 (42:39):
You two coup and eye.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
Isaiah has had an outstanding ourgency here.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
He has Jackson.
Speaker 3 (42:44):
You thinking Jack, get me Jack.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
I'm going with.
Speaker 4 (42:48):
Sorry, guys, sorry, I ogon Jerome's going to redeem himself.
I'm thinking Jerome Lewie, man of the match and first
try scorer, and I think the margin is going to
be about twelve points.
Speaker 3 (42:59):
Yeah. Nice, that's that is conceivable. I like it. Nice one,
enjoy the game.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
Nice one, Daddy,
Yeah, gooday, guys, it's Maddie John's here. Look at as
you can tell on just not myself at the moment,
a little bit down, but tell it'll cheer me up.
Hitting the follow but on our podcast with the Family
podcast and backstage, so you don't miss any of the
good stuff we've got coming up. And thank you guys,
Thank you again for listening to the podcast and giving
us your support.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Good on you guys, and welcome back. It's begun. What
a big week it is State of Origin. Matthew're about
to do our preview. We have our review on Wednesday,
but I also wanted to look ahead just for a second.
We have Tim Zoo up next week letting people know
ahead of his big fight, as well as the week
after Friend of the Show Thomas Starling. So if you
(00:39):
haven't already likened, subscribe, leave a positive review, no negative stuff,
because without you guys listening, without you guys engaging, we
wouldn't be able to do this, this beautiful thing that
we call life in this podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
And two good guys coming up.
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Tom Starling of course playing the best footballer his career
in a team that is top of the table. And
we'll finish in the top two and very well could.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
Win the premiership.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
And the other oneys you said before Tim Zuo against
Sebastian Fandora on the same card as many Pacquiao and
Mario Barrios, which is huge in July twenty So yeah,
a couple of big ones coming up and look.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Forward to it coops.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Correct. But let's not focus too far ahead because right
now in the present state of Origin, Game three a
very much anticipated game, A big decider in Sydney last
year it was at Suncourt, Queensland Territory. This year in
New South Wales. Have you played in any deciders and
if so, where was it.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
I only played four Origin games, but yeah, one of
them my last Origin game was a decider eight at
the City Football Stadium. That was a game that I
had the worst preparation I've spoken about before because I
was I was dropped. I was, I was unsurprising dropped.
After game one, I was barely used. I played about
fifteen minutes off the bench and I was surplus to requirements.
Speaker 3 (01:53):
So I got dropped.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
And then that was a mixed that was a split round.
So me and a few of the Castle boys who
went out and had a merle had about half a dozen,
maybe a dozen beers, and then I woke up. And
then I got tipped off that night too. It was
crooked then. And got a call from the morning and said, mate,
you were in get down here, you're playing hooker. Went
to the airport. There was no there was no ticket
(02:17):
for me. I went to buy a ticket. There were
no seats on the plane. Luckily the pilot went past
and I was sitting on the floor in the cockpit
between the two pilots. Got down there late for the game.
I got there for the game, but late in preparations.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Just a jump because I've heard this story a few
times and it's actually I never actually picked up. That
was on game day right, So like they they asked
you to fly the day of the game. This wasn't
for Captain John right, this is on the Wednesday.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
No, this is I went down, I landed, and then
a few hours later I'm on the way to the
sitting football standing to play and Cooper. Of all the
origins I played them, it was a low bar as
far as how I played, But that was the best
game I played. I played hooker. Firstly, for two reasons.
I reckon, I'd play my best origin game. I think
about it too much. Just went out there and played.
And secondly, playing hooker. Like playing playing hooker, it was
(03:08):
so much easier than playing in the halves. Really, I
mean harder physically, but you don't have to steal anyone
around the park. All I could do is make sure
I made men tackles, you know, give good service out
of dummyhalf. And there was one mark Lane on the
ground scoot. Very simple, simple things to worry about as
opposed to having to corrolling the whole team.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
But it is it's a different fitness, right, Like I
imagine the lungs would have been burning.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
Well. I played about twelve.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Months of hooker coop coming through the grades when I
was younger, and so you sort.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Of get used to it.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
Yeah, oh it's totally different, totally different fitness, but there's
a different feel in the decider. When got to the
ground ran on, there was just and the nature of
the contest it was more intense.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Yeah, well was there a lot more? What was the crowd?
What do you remember from the house?
Speaker 1 (03:52):
Full house, a full house, Sitney Football Stadium forty zero.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
How did that compare to like a let's say a
ninety seven Grand Final crowd, because that was that at
Sydney Football State and City Football State.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
I think the biggest crowd ever at Sydney Football Stadium
was Grand Final, that ninety seven Grand Final.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
But different, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
It's just a very different, very different atmosphere, very very
different feeling. As proud as you are representing New South Wales,
there's something very special about playing a Grand Final with
your tribe.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah, and I imagine like the tribe that you grew
up with, right, it'll be like the Travrovich brothers running
out for a Grand Final, like imagine a quite emotional fine.
Not that they will get that this year.
Speaker 3 (04:34):
No, just no pressure on them.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
You look at what's happening in Israel, in the Ukraine,
you know, no pressure exactly. The other thing, mate, you're
going to die. You're going to die eventually. Work backwards
from that, good perspective.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Yeah, but let's go through some of the teams. Let's
start with New South Wales because they had no changes, right,
there was a lot of speculation that they were going
to drop the chef Stefano.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
Bring in chef, bring in Keyon. Yeah, that was looked
like it was going to be likely. But for anyone
that knows Laurie Daily, there's no surprise that he's stuck, loyal.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
And did you like that if you were coaching, how
do you like that decision?
Speaker 1 (05:15):
As far as if I was coaching, I don't know.
I would have been tempted to bring keyon in. But
I'm actually once the decision was made to keep Stefana,
I'm actually really happy with it. I'm happy for him.
There's far too much in New South Wales in the
last four or five years. Just pick a blake, drop
a blake, bring him in, get rid of him.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
And I think you look at that game as well,
like New South Wales did not come out of the
blocks hard and by the time, like Stefano was on
the back foot a lot of the time, that Queensland
pack was so up for it. It's very hard to judge.
You know, you put him in that game. One performance,
he might go out there and blitz them like pain hasted,
But that game too was very hard for someone through
the middle to actually have an impact. A Queensland was
(05:52):
so up for it emotionally.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Right, and and the other one you're spot on and
The other one is it takes a player time to
get used to stef of Origin. Like I just said,
in my last Origin game, I Reckon, I finally sort
of got the hang of really what it was about
and what you needed to do. So Stefano every game
he'll play, he'll play, he'll get better. And if you
drop Blakes, you just lose them. Well, you lose them
(06:14):
if you know, particularly Blakes are unfairly dropped.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
You know, it's very hard to pick him again.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
Because they just lose, They lose faith and trust in
the whole process.
Speaker 2 (06:24):
Yeah, yeah, Stefano is a I met him a few times. Actually,
Steph terrific bloke. He's a lovely kid mate, one of
the one of the most humble blokes I reckon I've
met out so particularly he you know, he played Origin
by the time he'd already gone to Melbourne. He played
one game under Matge. But he's just such a humble bloke,
the boys say as well. He rips in a training
(06:45):
like he just works so hard for a big man,
always wanting to learn. So it's good to see Steph
back in the side.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Fantastic.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Yeah, yeah, you're really really happy for him, and you
can see the more he plays at the Melbourne Storm,
you see h bit by bit getting better. He's do
a lot more off like now. He's probably get more
and more comfortable there. So yeah, he looks well unsurprisingly
when you go to Melbourne.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
I don't know if you've ever been there.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
I was there. I was there, I was I was there.
I played there for about five years. Mate, you did
you did?
Speaker 3 (07:17):
You did?
Speaker 1 (07:18):
I mean the big story Coup is, it's the corns Lantern.
You've got to respect Billy Slater from this because Billy's
willingness to take some big selection gambles, even if it
means changing winning sight and basically and possibly getting hammered
afterwards because of it, heavy criticism in the pursuit of
(07:42):
following his gut.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
Feel is really to be admired.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
And when Caylen was injured with Liz Frank and they
needed to fullback, given the very fact Coup two reasons
I thought recently picked was because Billy has never been
backwards in his admiration for Reese and and the second
one was that if you were going to move Hammer
back to full back, you had to find another center.
(08:06):
Now probably the position that they lack the most depth
in is center coup given like young Robert Toy has been.
He was picked on the right center position and only
after a few first grade games. And so for that reason,
I thought it myself, none and he'll keep he'll keep
Hammer in the centers, and he'll he'll put recent fullback.
But Hammer's in better form, and he decided to put
(08:29):
Hammer back there and go right.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
I've got to.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
Find myself another one. He's gone with Shibasaki.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
It is interesting because like somebody, particularly Slatsy, who has
been under someone like Craig Bellamy for a long time.
Bells big thing was always like, you don't want to
weaken another position to strengthen another position, if that makes sense,
Like you don't want too much rearranging going on.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
By putting Hammer, who was on the wing in game two,
to full back, it now looks like they're going to
have to move Valentine Holmes to the right wing to
then bring Gamut Shibasaki on the to left center. So
there is a lot of changing of combinations. You've got
to move the bloke who did a good job at
left center val over to the right wing, hawing a
fullback a debutae at left center marking Stephen Crichton, which
(09:11):
is possibly one of the biggest jobs on the field.
So yeah, it shocked me too that it wasn't just
a you know, bring recent and then you get to
keep all the other pieces the exact same, Yeah, which
is unusual for somebody who you know, has done a
lot of his learning under Craig. But I mean, I
actually like what he's when I look at the side now,
I do like what he's done because it's an inform
(09:34):
side like Gamba ship Osaki. He's been in terrific form
for a Broncos side that's been quite inconsistent.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
It's a very much a feel good story coup.
Speaker 3 (09:45):
If he goes out.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
There and brains it's a fairytale story given the fact
that we gamutt. He has played forty five NRL games
since twenty eighteen. So twenty eighteen he's gone, He's gone, Broncos, Knights, Cowboys,
South Sydney.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
No, No, not so he went. He went, so after
nights he went to Japanese rugby, yes, and then he
come back to the Cowboys and then went to Townsville
Blackhawks and just played there yep.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
And then he had had two games at South, did
he Yep? And he had a couple couple of games
at South, then went back to the Broncos and as
she said, stint Japanese rugby in between and every club
he's been at, it's only been a very short stint
and they've allowed him to go. So for him to
arrive this year, and Mad's has had a fair bit
of criticism this year about training too high, but the
(10:33):
proofs and the budding there with him. Yeah, yeah, like
how good he's playing.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
And he was a boom junior. A lot of people
probably don't was he know that? Yeah? I know he played.
He played under like eighteen's under twenties origin with the
likes of like AJ Brimson, Harry Grant was in that
side as well, and they all raved about him, saying
how good he was coming through juniors, juniors and then yeah,
for whatever reason when he first sort of come into
first grade, found couldn't find his feet a little bit.
(10:58):
I know that Broncos side he first come into, they
were really struggled like that.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
I think that was a awfully awful time to go
into the Broncos.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Yeah, you saw a lot of blokes kind of fall
it like Xavier Coats kind of came in and out
of that side. A lot of blokes struggled with consistency.
But it's good to see him going good.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
It's interesting that you say that because Coops, when when
tom didn't first went to the Cowboys, and of course
tom didn't had about three years of the Broncos pull
bugger in that the worst possible time. Spoke to when
we're trying to unlock the reason why why did ship
of sarchy bounce around? Never could find you really get
any traction. Talking to Todd Peyton after Tommy did In's
(11:35):
first year at the Cowboys, and he said, I said, what,
given what he'd endured at the Broncos, tell me what,
how did tom didn't turn up? He said, mate, he
was a nervous wreck. He said, he just picked his
nails at training, he said, he said he just felt
that sorry for him, and bit by bit, you know
that they they's got that out of him, or they
(11:57):
drew some confidence out of him, or injected some confidence
and he is able to be the player that you
know that everyone us was in there somewhere, but he
was just traumatized by the whole Broncos experience might have
been the same with Shibasaki. As I said before, it's
it's a feel good story. It could be a fairy tale,
but it's.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
An enormous risk. Now if we're going to talk.
Speaker 1 (12:20):
About in the cold, hard, late light of day, it's
an enormous risk because what you've got on the edge,
the center is a position where you'd get one on
one battle. Still, not a lot of positions on the
field you do, but the center is one that you
definitely do. So they've got Robert Toyer and Shubasaki against
Latrell and Stephen Crichton.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
Now that those.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Two players, as far as experience in high pressure football,
are not even in the same postcode, not even the
same country. So that's the extent of the risk that
Billy is taken.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
Jack actually played with Gat I believe as well.
Speaker 4 (12:59):
Yeah, play with them in Newcastle twenty twenty one. He
good fella too, gammutt he Yeah. He struggled a bit
through twenty twenty one. He debuted at the nights, he
debuted Broncos I think the year before, and then he
played a handful of games I think maybe half the
year or so, and finals for the Knights in twenty
twenty and then twenty twenty one. Yeah, he just sort
(13:20):
of struggled a bit and struggled to get back into contention.
What's he like as a blow Oh champion fella great,
great blow good honest, real happy bloke. But it was
really hard for him to because he's in the top thirty.
I'm pretty sure in twenty twenty one he didn't even
get brought up to the COVID bubble. I think they
just they left him. He then from there went to
Japanese rugby because he's a Japanese passport.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
That's right, he has a Japanese passport.
Speaker 1 (13:44):
Shibasaki is very much he sounds like a Japanese name,
so yeah, interesting one of his mum where his dad
got Japanese Japanese which had his facial hair, because because
it must be he might it must be either his
dad his month, because Japanese passport is probably the hardest
pass to get in the world.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
Yeah, that's right, Because isn't there that old story about
Hugh Jackman.
Speaker 1 (14:04):
Hugh Jackman, Gus told me Gus Warland, who's best mate
when he goes When Jacko goes to Japan, they absolutely
go nuts because you know they love, yeah, the Wolverine,
they love the cartoons sort.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
But he also filmed that one of the Wolverines was
based out of Japan's Oh was it? Yeah, there was
that one where he fought like the Japanese samurai.
Speaker 3 (14:25):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
Right, So Jacko goes there a fair bit and enjoys
amazing popularity there.
Speaker 3 (14:29):
Remember that. Gus told us the story.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
There and I was going to say Japanese restaurant in Japan,
but of course it is. It was in a restaurant
in Japan, and he had a hat on and one
person just pegning, and he said, within fifteen minutes there
were two thousand sorry spotted him. Yeah, and within fifteen
minutes there were two thousand people out the front of
(14:52):
the sushi restaurant just chanting for him to come out.
But yeah, he loved the He loves the country so
much so he actually inquired with it, the Japanese passport,
and they took offense.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Wow. Yeah, So what's the why why do they take
offense to that? Is that just because they.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Of all the countries in the world, no one tries,
no one, no one preserves.
Speaker 3 (15:10):
Their culture like Japan. They like to keep it very Japanese.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
It's it's yeah, and that dates that dates way way
back from the from the old days of the Christian
missionaries and everything. What happened with Savance Xavier went in.
But that's a whole different story.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Let's not go there now.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
We're talking state of origin.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
That is true. We get side sometimes. What about the
other big inclusion, Big Josh Papa Lee out of retirement
back into the Queensland side. How did you love that?
Speaker 1 (15:35):
Well, this is a this is another bombshell, but it's
not a big risk in my opinion.
Speaker 3 (15:40):
It's not a big gamble.
Speaker 1 (15:41):
This is but well, he's you know, he's dropped mofod
a waker from a winning side of the Golden Rule again.
Billy's gone no, no, If I my gut feel is
we need something, I'm going to make the change again.
I admire him for that Big Papa's He's brought. From
my understanding. I was talking to Cooper Krong. Billy has
had this up his sleeve for a couple of series
(16:02):
and this was the one. Okay, I'm going to produce
the ace right now. And because they're going to need
something cooped for for Queensland to beat New South Wales
in a just sider in Sydney. Given the team we had,
they're gonna need something special. They're gonna He's brought him
in for a big lift in inspiration, big lift in
(16:22):
emotion and it's a it's a good story. It's a
little bit like it's a little bit like alf you know,
Alan Langer retire returning that time from England. I mean
not to that extent, but it's a big one. If
you look at the pack, I mean Tina Carrigan, Papa,
you know you've got Kirk Caate well in the back
(16:43):
round as well. He's it's a formidable pack now beefs
it up.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
And when you talk to the Canberra boys like obviously
Tommy Starling and Zach Hosking, we have a lot to
do with talking to those lads what Josh property brings
in the ships and emotionally to a team like they
all love him so much and they all admire him
and he brings the best out in other players. And
(17:09):
even when I remember when Munster used to come back
from State of Origin he played with Papa before he
retired from the State of Origin arena, but he'd come
back and rave about Big Papa in there, like having
somebody because they haven't really had a player in that
Queensland camp probably the last two games. Who the young
crop look at and go like, I was watching this
(17:29):
guy play Stut of Origin and you know, play for
the Raiders when I was fifteen sixteen, Like he's been
around for a long time. You don't realize how many
games and how old he is.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
Regan Tina.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Papa would be one of Tueno's heroes. Yea, so Tino
would be just pinched himself, can't mate right, And for
people who don't understand that, it's not just watching admiring
a hero playing, it's actually those players trying to impress
their heroes, going above and beyond to say, I'm playing
alongside this guy going to I'm going to show him unworthy.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
It makes it and even and that's not even in
the game. That's like all week of training, Like that's
having a bloke there like that what it the intensity
that it brings to the training session because as you know, Matthew,
when even when when even when your head coach he
might your head coach might be sick for a week
and you have the assistant there, the intensity the training load.
Nothing drops, but the intensity drops two percent of each
(18:23):
of the players because you haven't got that presence of
the leader there, who's who's sort of he doesn't have
to say anything, but him being there brings everyone up. Yeah,
it's the same with players, like when players go out
to go play State of Origin. I have no doubt
that the training sessions at club Land they drop in
intensity a little bit because those key players leave. Josh
(18:43):
Papa is going to bring.
Speaker 3 (18:44):
That, Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
And he went in the camp a few days later
than everybody else because he's of course his wife had
a newborn son. It's fantastic, so so Billy allowed him
to stay with the family for a few extra days.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
And Stefano also arrived, Like did you read so he
missed his flight, David, which is like, imagine that, right,
your your Stefano and there's reports that you might lose
your position. They stick and he goes bloody oth, I'm
going to go into training, I'm going to rip in
all week. I'm going to go out there and play
an awesome game. The first job you have is to
(19:17):
make sure you get on the flight at the right time.
Apparently he read the boarding time or the departure time
as the boarding time. So he's obviously thought that's an
hour later, and he's in the taxi out there on
the way and he looks down and realizes that like
it's boarding. As he's driving out, he had to ring
Frank Penisy Frankie Vanisi and go, sorry, Frank, I'm not
(19:39):
going to make my fly. God, oh mate.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
That would be didn't send him the flight details?
Speaker 2 (19:44):
No, probably, but mate, that is the most thaying that
you would have been. He'd be wigging out so bad.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
Be awful.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
So coops, this series, you've gone into camp, what's belly
ach like, what's his demeanor as part of the coaching staff.
Speaker 3 (20:01):
Compared to what he's like at Melbourne? Is is like?
Speaker 1 (20:05):
Did you find him intense as focused?
Speaker 2 (20:10):
You know what? Like even chatted a few of the boys,
like we had Presto and kind of Watson come on
the potty and they sort of spoke about how he
doesn't really do much video. He's just sort of sits
back and lets him do the thing. When I was
at the training session in camp in there very much
the same like I will. He was just sort of
standing over the side, just sort of watching the training
session on his own, and then I was going up
(20:31):
and yarnen to him while he was watching. It was lighthearted,
as I don't think he's putting too much. I don't
think he's riding like he obviously rides that club emotion.
But the strength of belly, which probably a lot of
people don't understand, is how observing he is. Like he's
not technically, he's not going to sit there and go
this is you know, do this and that with all
the shapes and stuff, but he is so observant of
(20:54):
players and like he sees things that no other coach
or person really noticed. I remember we go in after
a loss and we would sit there in video and go, oh,
he's going to talk about, you know, us missing this
tackle that led to this tribe stuff. But he would
notice things from three sets before or four tackles before,
(21:14):
and go, this is what we did wrong that led
to and this. You can see the effect of how
this happened two plays later because we weren't able to
contain that it gave them the advantage which then led
to this and which is such a powerful because it
educates players so well and going okay, me missing the
tackle there. That wasn't actually that that was you know,
(21:35):
I can try to make that, but I can make
it easier on ourselves by us doing this throughout the set.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Throw a pebble in a pond, and what happens. The
reverberations go out, you know, you see the reverberations just
go from the pebble in the pond. That's what it's
like you're talking about there where you go, a reverberation happens,
you know, way over there, but it was a result
of the pebble hitting the pot way back here.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Yeah, the yeah, yeah, it's it's he's so so intelligent
like that. So I've his role kind of sits like that.
I believe where he sits back and he will just
kind of come in when he sees when he notices
something that no one else notices that you know, it
might be a slipping complacency, it might be a lack
of effort. He's really good at pointing out effort stuff
(22:22):
that no one else notices. He will chime in there
and tell He'll tell Loz or you'll tell someone else
in presence.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
Yeah, they beat one eye on him the whole time.
And you're talking about players from other clubs going there.
Craig Bellamy's on the sideline like they'd be working hard
to impress him.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
You know, it was interesting. Remember when we had Presto
on it. He was like, you know it Craig Bellamy,
like and he didn't have too much to say to me.
You just come up and said this thing. But like
the whole time, I'm going like, shit, that's Craig Bellamy.
You just sometimes forget, like I suppose, like when Eve,
when you've been coached by a certain player, with a
certain coach or whatever, you don't realize how much presence
(22:58):
they actually have and how other players at other clubs
actually still idolize them.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
Okay, talking about like you, we've spoken about Craig Bellamy. Okay,
Over into the other bunker, you've got the Coueensland blokes
and Harry Grant's been there for a number series number serious.
But you spard to Trent Ero a little bit. Trent
is new and so he's going in as a fresh
set of eyes. What does he said about some of
(23:23):
the players.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Yeah, I caught up with them after game the day
after Game two actually for a coffee over in the
Eastern suburbs.
Speaker 3 (23:31):
Mate.
Speaker 2 (23:31):
You know what was funny that Trent said, Actually he
goes leading into a good insight into someone like Kurk Kate. Well, right,
we spoke about how good he played Game two. So
he was wrestling with kirk Kate. Well, the five minutes
before they were about to go warm up. You get
a partner in your pummel and you wrestle just to
warm up your shoulders. He said he has never wrestled
(23:52):
someone so strong in his life.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
Yeah, he was like, so there's some players ja Ja
Vrovich is the same Tom Eisenhuth who just retired on
the Dragons and we played together at Melbourne. He was
possibly the strongest player I've ever come up against.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
So wow, that wiry strength.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
It's a group strength that like they can throw, like
they're not strong in the weight room, but when they
get their hands on you, they could suffocate. They're like
a python, they can suffocate up camera.
Speaker 3 (24:17):
Smith probably would have been the same.
Speaker 2 (24:18):
That sort of great Cameron Smith. I'll get the funny
Smith story actually in the second. But yeah, Trent said
when he was wrestling with Kirk Kate, well, he was like,
it was actually getting me angry. How strong he was
because I felt like it actually, yeah, it made me
feel like it made me feel weak. I'm a veg
man and I'm about to run out into a start
(24:38):
like my first starting role playing State of Origin game two,
a must win game, and Kirk kate Well's making him
feel weak.
Speaker 3 (24:45):
He's a veag man.
Speaker 2 (24:47):
Go over to camera Smith for a second, right, So
Smithy was like no one ever beat Smithy on knee wrestling,
so letting people know you dropped your knees and you
kind of fight for to get the other player to
the ground. He was really like strong in that sense,
like so strong around the hips and core. And the
only person that I ever saw take it too far
(25:09):
was Smithy. And in ground wrestling with shandor Or earl
our Man, Shandor took upon himself. He gets very competitive.
He didn't want to lose to him. And we were
sitting on the side because forwards would go forwards and
bigger players would go together first and the backs would
sit back, and we were genough Shanna going, you're not
going to beat smith You're not going to beat smith.
He put him in a reen naked choke hold and
started choking him out. Like to the point where it
(25:32):
was like, you're not going to choke out the captain
and Cameron smith and Smithy started just like hitting him
in the head while it was that funny and we're
going shandle let him go. And then like the rest
of us came and Shanda no choking out? What are
you doing?
Speaker 1 (25:46):
And she was like, oh, I thought, like win it
all Cross, I'm going to choke out the mortal yeahah,
tell the Green kids.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
It was so funny, you're so strong.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
Let's have a talk about coop.
Speaker 1 (25:55):
Someone talk about it, like, Okay, probably we have a
blues bias. We try, you know, we our thing is
that we try to lower our guns as far as
you know, being pure blues and yeah, whatnot for the
sake of having a fair and reasonable discussion about the game.
But we have talked about the things that are just
really crucial, some of the things that New South Wales
(26:17):
really need to do to make sure they win this
sider Yeah well New.
Speaker 2 (26:21):
South Well, I was in the box seat right, like
we've said it since game one. They're display that game
one and it leads into Queensland's narrative. But our side
on paper is one of one of the most talented sides.
We saw a game one. We even saw it second
half in Game two where you're down twenty four points
but they come back and rally and nearly win, like
(26:43):
nearly win to the point where you go one of
the best comebacks in Origin history. We are in the
box seat if we go out there and play well
to wrap up this series.
Speaker 3 (26:52):
Right.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
It's a classic narrative, it is, and Game two was
the classic result to the classic narrative.
Speaker 3 (26:58):
It will be careful. Yeah, we got to be careful coops.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
The first thing we've got to do, and it's a
no brainer, is discipline. Discipline is imperative for New South Wales.
Our discipline was terrible. Forget about all this talk about
ref bias and the penalty count. The reason we get
we got belt in the penalty count was our discipline
is so bad. Our ball security, which is part of
(27:23):
the discipline, was really bad. Hence the reason why we're
going at half time and we're down by such a large,
large martial margin. It was self inflicted wounds the second half,
which really should give them a lot of confidence if
we can get the discipline right. Is the fact that
when they finally got their focus in their heads.
Speaker 3 (27:42):
Right.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
You know, we nearly instigated a comeback for the Ages
to come from behind victory, perilously close from one of
those come back from behind victories. But discipline, discipline, if
we if we do have one thing we can do
in this game, if we are disciplined, our discipline is outstanding.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
Not a doubt in the world, we win.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
From a players perspective, right, I want to ask you
this question because I know my answer, but I want
to get you when you look at game two and
you look at how much defense and how hard New
South Wales made it for himself based on the penalty count,
based on errors, you know, kicking out in the full,
they do a lot of defense. When you look, do
(28:25):
you take confidence out of that coming into camp right now?
If you're the half fact at you sit there and
you go look at how hard we made this game
too for ourselves and we nearly won it. We nearly
came back and wont it given how much fuel we
burned that first half and how undisciplined we were. How
much confidence does that give you coming into game three?
Speaker 1 (28:47):
Two things coop as long as you establish the reason
why you were so ill disciplined. There's always a reason.
When you pull the sheets back, you sometimes can find
something like, you know what, boys, if you have a
look l last training session, we're a little bit or whatever,
or what about this, or maybe tactically we tried to
do this too much. Let's pull back here and push
(29:08):
our energies more there. If you can identify that gives
you a lot of confidence. Secondly, you've got to be
very very careful that something so which appears basic coop,
which really appears basic, and which is blatantly so obvious,
doesn't lead you down to the road of complacency.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1 (29:32):
We're you just go in there and say, hey, boys,
look at all the errors, look at this and look
at that. Boys, we just got to fix it up't
we win? It's not that simple, you know. The old
discipline is a byproduct sometimes of not quite having your
heads on, having a little bit of complacency there and
which New South Wales the game two is a classic.
It's another example of why there aren't there are very
(29:53):
few clean sweeps. It's because Queensland were just desperate. There
was not an out of complacency. You know, they're coming
off a win, they had to win, and we had
a little bit of a buffer. You know, it wasn't
absolutely crucial that we win, which led to just us
being a little off as far as desperation, and that's
part of that. That was one of the things that
led to our ill disciplined. That was a factor. So
(30:15):
we've just got to be careful. We've got to be
on top of those things. Yeah, okay, second one, really
obviously we just need Nathan to be as close as
he can to be one hundred percent fit, not going
to be one hundred percent fit, but close enough they
can actually do control all our.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
Aspects of our kicking. That was that was that.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
I think Nathan not not being able to really control
all those aspects of his kicking and use his array
of kicks was almost as big a factor as our discipline.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Do you do you think because he's growing obviously he
didn't kick for Penrith last week when he was goal kicking,
do you still think that if you were Nathan like
coming that same tactic coming sort of fifty in mainly
the shorter attacking kicks can take control of But would
you still want you are you saying you'd want him
(31:03):
to do the longer.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
I want him doing the longer kicking. I want him.
I want him.
Speaker 1 (31:07):
If he's able to doing the long kicking, the short kicking, ticking,
all the kicking, I don't I don't care if he
doesn't goal kick, yeah right, if he believes that there's
one sort of area that needs to pull back on
a little, just preserve, I'd be more than happy to
let Crichton or Lomax do the goal kicking. And I'll
(31:27):
be tempted to just push that ahead anyway and just
say no, Nathan, we can let him do the kicking, mate,
Because brother, when we get fifty out, I need you
to put some of those dead ball bombs up, things
like we have to think about this, remove everyone else
from the game, Nathan Cleary versus the hammer.
Speaker 3 (31:45):
Think about that.
Speaker 1 (31:47):
And when Nathan is able to execute all his array
of kicks, it's a nightmare for the fallback.
Speaker 3 (31:52):
You know he can.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
You know, Nathan with his kicking game, he creates tries,
he gets repeat sets, He allows his team to dominate
territorial and in that and in turn, he builds pressure.
He puts enormous pressure on their opposition full back. If
he isn't able to do the majority of our kicking
or able to kick as well as he could. Then
you know that brings you know that gives just slither
(32:17):
of hope isn't the right word, but it can bring
the hammer into the game, our long kicking game. Nathan
needs to kick for his long kicking needs to keep great,
and our key chase.
Speaker 3 (32:25):
Has got to be even better.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
So Nathan, you know that that's that that's a crucial
factors as crucial as our discipline.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Yeah, yeah, and that's and there's no it's no surprise
how important is when we saw game two, the lack
of our start came back to Nathan not being able
to control that kicking game because you saw Drome kick
the first one out in the.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
Fall yep Okay, next thing we need to do and
we did it. We didn't do it enough in game two.
Whenever we did something happen tries or breaks or easy meters.
We got to get Latrelle and Stephen Crichton clean, fast.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
Early ball.
Speaker 1 (33:02):
And and there's a few reasons here. The big one
is the fact that again sub of Psaki and Toya
against Latrelle and Stephen Crichton, we don't. What we've got
to be conscious of here is we don't need to
do really elaborate sets of six or elaborate attacking players
(33:26):
and sequences to create a numerical advantage for those outside men.
You know, you just want to just get to the ball,
ping ping, get just getting fast early cleaning ball, get
them one on one with those opposition player. And you know,
if you think early in the game, if you're sub
of Psarki and the ball goes you know, to Crichton
and he goes Bush and he pushes off first, Like,
(33:47):
you know, what does that do to your conference? You
want in those early touches. You want Latrell and you
want Stephen Crichton having time and space opposite those, you know,
those inexperienced origin players to try to just dent their
confidence a little bit.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
What it also doesn't look whether it makes Toya or
ship Asaki's their confidence. But what it does to your
wingers too, Xavier Coats and Valentine Holmes, and you saw
it a few times in Game two where if you
don't trust your center inside you, you feel obliged to
come out and jam outside in and try to land
on them. But the beauty of Crichton and Latrell is
their quick hands. You know you saw Game one, that
(34:26):
beautiful quick hands from Latrell because the winger thought I'm
going to come out and land on because he didn't
trust his center.
Speaker 3 (34:30):
Okay, Coop, that's going to bring me to the next point.
That's a that's a good in for me. Is that
you got to think about this.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Slater is going to go to Toya and Shibasaki. He's
going to say, fellas, we've got to get off the
line fast and we've got a pressure and get in
their face. So if if I'm Laurie, I'm telling Nathan,
and I'm telling Isaiah and Jerome Leway, I'm saying, boys,
very how far you take the.
Speaker 3 (34:58):
Ball into the defense. If you go bang it.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
Like and you do what a ballplayer should do and
take it all the way into the cold face to
your target defender, then you're giving the opportunity for sub
with Psaki and Toya to snuff our center outside in.
So I'd be encouraging to say, hey, boys, sometimes take
it all the way the line to try to strip
shorter numbers, but other times take one step and then
(35:24):
let it go and you're going to catch them in
no man's land if that means, because I think at
times Toyaba p SSARCHI are going to pre empt outside in.
Speaker 2 (35:33):
Yeah, well it worked for him Game two. I think
that was a clear plan. They came in. They wanted
to go and jam Dylan Edwards out the back of
shape so that he couldn't get early ball to Cryton
on the trail. And then you saw that second half
they started to create some variations where they played a
little bit earlier, or they tunnel balled it, which is
firing it straight to the center so that straight through
so they can't jam on them. So I imagine that they'll
(35:56):
have a bit of a plan around that jamming.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
Critteral literally got to help their heart as well. Those
those two blokes are so good. I don't want them
just in their ten minute corridor. I mean, look at
Turbo the other night for manly switching having the intelligence
to look and go nothing really on here. I want
to switch to the other side. And you think about this,
you think about Latrelle coming to the other side and
him and Crichton working in combination. I mean the mismatch
(36:21):
that creates Yeah, I want to see I want to
see him do more of that. In fact, I can't
believe more clubs don't do it, you know, trusting that
there's a lot of smart centers out there that can
clearly look up and see the ball coming across and
nothing's going to be an offe you'll want to switch
to the long side.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Yeah, it is weird that clubs probably don't do that
as much anymore. I think they like to have their
structure control. Yeah yeah, but there's times when you can
have your controlled structure and then giving your smart, creative
outside backs, whether it's a winger or center, licensed to
do that. Turbo is good because he has footy instincts
of a halfback yep, and he can if he knows
(36:59):
when he's got to stay there, and then he knows
when the ball's going over that way you can go.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
It opens a whole Pandora's box as well as far
as the opposition and how they react to it. Because
back in the day Coup, if I'm a center on
the left side and I'm marking Malmaninger a malmoninger, all
of a sudden, the ball's coming over here and there's
a play the ball and he switches. Guess what uster switches, well,
i'd have to switch as well.
Speaker 3 (37:23):
He creates, so.
Speaker 1 (37:24):
You're not creating that mismatch. It's not as as vital
these days as it was in the eighties and seventies,
simply because our each back roll is so athletic. Yeah,
but still it would just be interesting to see how
a defense would.
Speaker 2 (37:38):
React to these days. Now. I've been in games where
there has been centers that used to switch over. Coriots
used to do it a bit for the Broncos. He'd
switch from the wing and go and float over the
left side when we played against him. And now the
plan always is in the modern day game is the
winger just communicates he's when he sees the winger, all
the center go. The winger would yell out, and then
(37:59):
they put They pushed the back roller over to the
open side. They don't really follow them anymore, just because
they'd like to keep everyone in there. Certain defensive of course, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
But the other one, the other one Cook we've got
to do is we have to be willing queens.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
Queens the't going to be right up for physically.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
They're going to kick long into the corners and they're
kind of try to jam us game two. Unsurprisingly, after
what we did to them with our yardage and game
in game one, they push enormous amount of energy, defensive
energy into stopping plays one, two and three Edwards zak Lomax,
and we didn't sort of there was once down the
right side we gave the ball, went one to really
(38:41):
simple three passes to Stephen Crichton, who took twenty meters.
Speaker 3 (38:44):
We've got to be able to do that.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
They're going to they're going to kick along to us,
they're going to tighten and they're going to.
Speaker 3 (38:49):
Try to rush.
Speaker 1 (38:50):
If they do that, we don't need to try to
be fancy. It's just one to three passes. Take the
easy meters. They're daring you, come on, push the ball
of the edges. Come on, take a risk. We'll lander
risk if you do. It's simple one, two, three, take
twenty meters, play the ball, then start going forward.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
Yeah, if you don't think about scoring a try or
going around a team off it. If you have the
mentality of I'm just running to get tackled in twenty meters,
it's pretty safe. It's a pretty should.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
We have a predictions, a couple of there's just another
thing I want to speak about here, and this is
this is massive for New South Wales. It's a huge one.
Is Munster and Tom didn't, but particularly Camera Monster in
the Camera Monster era, Queensland have been very, very difficult
(39:41):
to beat when they have a run first past second mentality.
When Monster runs the ball, things things happen. So it's
very easy to say, I don't let him run the ball.
We don't have control of that. What's so important though,
is for Munster we do not present visual opportunity. Our
defense is set, you know, or a set as it
(40:02):
can be sometimes too quick play the ball, but basically,
don't show in space. You don't have your space is wrong,
have your space is perfect, and have blokes they're sitting
there nominating Monster. So when Monster looks up, he doesn't
recognize visual opportunity. If he wants to run the ball,
he's going to have to do it through blind faith,
because the moment he spots that someone looks a little tired. Here,
(40:24):
he's a little bit of space, a little bit disjointed.
They're not coming off their line quick enough, he'll go.
So prevention is better than the cure. The other one
is Tom did and Tom didn't, doesn't stop. He just
goes all the time, and his trademark is showing go.
They can't be conned into one of his dummies. No
dummies off dead and the third ones you'll mate, Harry
grant Is. I've spoken about discipline before having I will
(40:48):
say this, be willing here and there during the game
to give a six tackle repeats, set away if it
means controlling Harry, slowly, play the balls, get your markers set.
If he regularly gets out of dummy half, we're in trouble.
Speaker 2 (41:06):
Yeah, particularly inside your own Yeah, you know your own
try line. You're trying to defend it. You saw how
effective he was in game two when he gets out
and you know his halves are pushing off him. But
like you said with did and show and go, not
presenting those trying to present a straight line, so he
doesn't have any visual cues where he knows he needs
to run or when you're out there in the in
(41:27):
the washing machine, and it is it's a hard discs.
Speaker 1 (41:31):
It's just got to be hard and fast rule. You know,
even if they've got a little advantage on you, don't
don't be tempted to try to protect the three on
two on the outside. No dummies, Yeah, no dummies. Let
the outside men solve it.
Speaker 2 (41:43):
Who wins math.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
New South Wales win and we get our discipline right.
I think we win a twenty eight eight. I'm going
to go man of the match Nathan Cleary. So injury
hasn't allowed him to really dominate the series like we
thought he was going to be able to. If he's fit,
(42:05):
I think this could be the game.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
I'm with you on that. I had coins in game two,
but I I feel New south Wales are just too
They're too good a side. I think I think they'll
have their head screwed on given the first half a
Game two. I've got New South Wales and I've got
them twenty two to twelve nice, and I have my
man of the match. I don't have Nathan Clear. I'm
(42:28):
trying to think who I've got. You know I've got.
I'm thinking maybe a paying hass again, paying hass games
Game one and three don't go broke back in pain?
Speaker 1 (42:36):
Yeah mate, it's You're not wrong, Isaiah.
Speaker 3 (42:39):
You two coup and eye.
Speaker 1 (42:41):
Isaiah has had an outstanding ourgency here.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
He has Jackson.
Speaker 3 (42:44):
You thinking Jack, get me Jack.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
I'm going with.
Speaker 4 (42:48):
Sorry, guys, sorry, I ogon Jerome's going to redeem himself.
I'm thinking Jerome Lewie, man of the match and first
try scorer, and I think the margin is going to
be about twelve points.
Speaker 3 (42:59):
Yeah. Nice, that's that is conceivable. I like it. Nice one,
enjoy the game.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
Nice one, Daddy,
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