Roberts the odd-man-out the Broncos don’t need
The last thing the Broncos need is for James Roberts to cause a Folau-like division in the ranks — so Anthony Seibold is getting in early, MIKE COLMAN reports
Opinion
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Alas poor Jimmy, we knew him well.
With James Roberts training in a ‘B Team’ singlet for the second week in a row all clues point to him being very much on the outer with Broncos coach Anthony Seibold.
Especially with Jack Bird’s injury giving Seibold the perfect opportunity to bring him back into the side.
The fact that he hasn’t, raises a very big question: what has Roberts done wrong?
After all, the Broncos are hardly setting the world on fire. With three wins out of nine so far this season you’d think Seibold would jump at the chance to have the incumbent NSW Blues Origin centre run on against the reigning premiers on Friday night.
Instead, he has chosen to go with rookie Gehamat Shibasaki to mark Latrell Mitchell, one of the most dangerous players in the game.
You have to think Seibold’s decision is about more than on-field performance.
It is true that Roberts hasn’t been in the best of form but the same could be said of Darius Boyd and Anthony Milford who Seibold stuck by week after week until they showed signs of coming good.
And the sensational 90 metre try he scored against the Dragons in round three showed just what he is capable of if given even a hint of space.
Could Shibasaki score a similar try? It’s doubtful, but then again not too many players past of present could either.
So what has Shibasaki got that Roberts hasn’t? If the talk around town is to be believed, it is the right attitude to fit in with the kind of culture that Seibold is trying to build.
Culture. One of the most overused words in the sporting lexicon. No doubt Roberts would tell you that as far as Anthony Seibold is concerned culture could be defined as, “agreeing with whatever Seibold says.”
Most players could say the same thing about their coach, and it’s true.
A winning team is a team in which everyone is singing from the same songsheet, from coach down to water boy. It doesn’t take much to upset the harmony of a side — just one or two players getting out of step with the rest and causing division can be a cancer.
It is exactly what is happening in Australian rugby right now. News Corp rugby writer Jamie Pandaram wrote a very illuminating piece on the weekend in which he gave an interesting insight into the fallout from the Israel Folau shemozzle.
According to him, the Wallabies are a team split in two, with the large Polynesian contingent at odds with management over their treatment of Folau whom they regard as their spiritual leader.
Pandaram revealed that the division in the team first came to a head last September when Fijian-born winger Sefanaia Naivalu was made unavailable for a Test against Argentina and sent home early after missing a team bus.
“So when, in November, Adam Ashley-Cooper and Kurtley Beale brought three women back to their Cardiff hotel room after a match, there was accusations of double standards from the Pacific Island members of the team,” he wrote.
“Folau was a key voice in this standoff, and captain Michael Hooper agreed that the breach of an internal team rule could not go unpunished. Coach Michael Cheika eventually made the call to drop the pair for the crucial final Test of the year, which they lost comprehensively to England.”
Now that Folau is the one being punished by authorities, that chasm between the factions within the team has deepened to Grand Canyon proportions and any chance the Wallabies had at the World Cup would appear long gone.
The last thing Anthony Seibold needs is for James Roberts to become “his Folau”.
Seibold would have too much on his plate right now to be following the goings-on at Rugby Australia but if he needs any confirmation that he is going in the right direction where Roberts is concerned he need only ask Michael Cheika.
“You think you’ve got a problem brewing?” he’d tell him. “Make sure you get in first.”
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