Select NSW squad members sent a none-too-subtle message to their Queensland rivals in the way they celebrated their Origin series victory on Wednesday night in jerseys and dress pants.
No one was saying it out loud, but it was a sledge at the Queensland players, who hit the night spots of Brisbane last year wearing their jumpers. That was noted by certain Blues players who would not normally be out in Brisbane dressed in jerseys and chinos.
NSW players Bradman Best, Matt Burton and Dylan Edwards party on after the Blues’ big win.
There was genuine swagger in the way the Blues celebrated, from the new Blues song (which references Queensland) to the use of Michael Maguire’s baseball bat by Jarome Luai to get a beat going. “There was no special weapon to celebrate ... the only weapons were the boys who wore the blue jerseys out there,” Luai said. “I just want to enjoy history.”
Liam Martin said: “The baseball bat was Madge’s thing ... he made it famous in club times.”
Luai was photographed outside a Caxton Street pub in a prayer pose in another “up yours” to the Maroons, and also waved the crowd goodbye. It was a great series from the Blues No.6 when plenty were doubting him. He was close to player of the series in many people’s eyes.
Current and past Blues players combine to re-create the iconic Steve Mortimer image from the 1985 Origin series.Credit: NRL Photos
Maguire’s tribute to NSW great Steve Mortimer and his desire to create a Blues spirit based on the achievements of “Turvey” and the NSW team of 1985 is undoubted.
Photos of the Blues at the SCG, where they paid tribute to Mortimer and greats of his time, have been documented.
What hasn’t been so publicised is the bronze statuette that is being held by Mitchell Moses in the photo above. It’s the Blues’ private tribute to Mortimer that only the inner sanctum were privy to.
Billy marooned
Cameron Smith was the biggest missing factor for Queensland in this year’s State of Origin series – even more than Cameron Munster, Tino Fa’asuamaleaui and Thomas Flegler. NSW were missing superstar players as well, so the player drain was evenly shared, but Billy Slater needed Smith’s sharp mind and cool approach as an assistant in moments that got the better of the Maroons coach.
Smith has the street smarts that Slater needed. If Slater ever turns the job down as the Maroons head coach, Smith is the best person by far to replace him.
Slater’s selections and late changes to the starting 13 have been heavily criticised, but I’ll leave that to the play-by-play experts to dissect.
Queensland coach Billy Slater consoles fullback Reece Walsh after the Origin decider.Credit: Getty Images
Slater was schooled by NSW coach Michael Maguire in dealing with media, despite his ability to communicate and provide analysis as a commentator for Channel Nine. It was a strategic media mugging from a coach who has never been a noted expert media operator. I’ve struggled with Maguire in that realm. Slater was irritated from the moment Maguire came at him with the “glass houses” sledge, and from that time the Queensland campaign was on tilt.
Maguire knows Slater well from their time together at the Storm, knows which buttons to press, and took full advantage of that.
Slater was a great player, but he was never an easy media subject. The Queensland media say the same thing.
Slater went hard at me during the week, saying a story I broke was “fake news”, but it has no impact on my relationship with him, despite the News Corp media saying otherwise.
The story about the Queensland coaching staff and Selwyn Cobbo not seeing eye to eye is easily deniable and a debate I can’t win. I’m simply trusting my source.
I reported on Monday that members of the Maroons coaching staff were offside with Cobbo, who was a surprise omission for game two in Melbourne. The 22-year-old was a shock selection on the bench for the series opener before missing out at the MCG, but was recalled for the decider on the wing.
I have always had respect for Slater’s achievements on the field. That’s where it starts and finishes. To paint any disagreement as a Channel Nine split is garbage, but not unexpected.
We largely moved in different circles when he was a player and he works in an area of Nine that I have minimal involvement with.
Is he unhappy with me? No question. But I don’t actually have anything to do with him in any part of my working life.
What I have since discovered is that a senior News Corp journalist claims they had the same information as I did about Slater and Cobbo. Another reporter was telling anyone who would listen that that was the case, and they were freely offering up the source of the story. It was done at the top of his voice in the media box on game night.
The reporter also told Fox Sports pundit Gorden Tallis the area his colleague got his information from. When I called the journalist on it, there was considerable back-tracking.
I thought Cobbo put in for the Maroons with reasonable carries, but the game – and Bradman Best – passed him by.
After I ran the Cobbo story, a member of the Queensland support staff said to me in a text exchange: “It’s clear to me that you don’t know how young Indigenous men work.”
I have closely covered the long careers of Anthony Mundine and Greg Inglis, but that’s as close as I can come to understanding Indigenous athletes. I don’t pretend to understand all of their struggles, but I try. I have never walked in their shoes, and I don’t know how to interpret that text, other than the fact that it leans towards what I was told.
I’ll also happily produce the names of the News Corp reporters if challenged on that as well. But I will be keeping the identity of my source on the Cobbo story to myself. I’m expecting the story to be denied, and that’s OK. It wasn’t one I could ever hope to win.
Keary’s French lessons
Luke Keary had deep discussions with former Roosters Mitchell Pearce and James Maloney — who both had stints in France — before deciding to go to Europe. But the final say belonged to his wife, Amy. She has family in Malta and is happy for their young family to start school in France.
The offer in the end was too good to refuse and tossing in the chance to travel made it irresistible.
Keary is going out on top and has been in and around the Blues set-up this year. What was notable was the trust Michael Maguire put in him during his time on standby during the Origin series. Keary did more trips to the Blue Mountains and back than any other player as he juggled his role as an extra for the Blues and as a Roosters playmaker.
Catalans-bound Roosters veteran Luke Keary.Credit: Getty Images
Keary is a coach on the field and was a steadying influence around the Blues. That’s why Maguire kept bringing him back into camp.
The pair go way back to when South Sydney won the premiership in 2014. Maguire has a real trust in Keary and liked having him as another way of communicating his thoughts to the playing group.
Keary has a future in coaching if he wants it, but he seems more occupied by the idea of working in finance, or perhaps in the media.
Heat on Hooper
Fox Sports reporter James Hooper has been on his high horse criticising other media, but he needs to clean up his own act.
He has already had one incident when he jumped on a the bonnet of a car while intoxicated. But what isn’t as well known is the way he carried on in Las Vegas on an NRL-funded trip. He was hard at it most nights, including when he had to catch a plane with other reporters and Rooster Spencer Leniu for a promotion in Utah. Everyone was on board the flight to Salt Lake City, apart from Hooper. He missed the flight and had to scramble his way to Utah, arriving a couple of minutes before an event.
Previously, another reporter was forced to do on-camera interviews with Rabbitoh Campbell Graham because Hooper was a no show.
Hooper can no longer do the bidding of the sacked Paul Kent, and the pressure is on after a problem with a story on Kalyn Ponga and his father Andre.
Fox Sports was hit with a legal letter by Knights insider Blake Cannavo in May after Hooper reported Cannavo paid the Pongas $250,000 in allegedly unpaid third-party deals.
Cannavo denied he owed the Pongas any money, or that he had made any payment after Channel Nine revealed Ponga’s father, Andre, had gone to the NRL with concerns about money that might have been owed to his son.
Hooper changed his story on the Fox Sports website multiple times before it was eventually taken down. Hooper did not respond to calls for comment.
Not-so-secret agent
It was interesting to see player manager Isaac Moses at work in a corner lounge area of the Blues team hotel in Brisbane on the morning of Origin III.
Among the stars to pop in and sit down for lengthy chats were Mitchell Moses and Joseph Suaalii. Isaac did the same in Melbourne.
NSW rebranding
The Blues may be about to see their brand get a major makeover. Word is that a big-money deal with Adidas is on the way to replace Puma as their jumper and apparel sponsor.