Cooper Cronk will find Sydney NRL clubs very different to Melbourne Storm well-oiled machine

PAUL KENT: So Cooper Cronk is moving to Sydney. Now all he needs is to get a Lexus and discover how to have dreary conversations about real estate and he‘ll fit in wonderfully.

COOPER Cronk is moving to Sydney.

Now all he needs is to get a Lexus and discover how to have dreary conversations about real estate and he will fit in wonderfully.

Welcome to the big smoke, Coops.

So many people think Cronk is crazy.

He wants to leave the greatest football franchise in the country, the Melbourne Storm, for a conversation with half a dozen Sydney clubs high on dysfunction.

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There’s the Bulldogs, where the forwards play like halves and the halves play like forwards. The Tigers, whose “big four” got somehow whittled down to the “big two” once the hype was removed. The Sharks, whose future still lives on the promise of a developer and the Eels, still trying to erase the weight of systematic cheating.

All across Australia the Storm leave other clubs for dead. They are brick-solid and driven.

Collingwood, the great myth from Melbourne that often lays claim to being the club others aspire to, could only dream of doing what the Storm has done in this past decade. The Pies have no actual evidence to provide.

Tara Rushton and fiance Cooper Cronk. Cooper announced that the 2017 season will be his last season with the Melbourne Storm. Picture: INSTAGRAM @tararushtonfox

And Melbourne did it on the back of four people, and just four. Coach Craig Bellamy, skipper Cameron Smith, Billy Slater at fullback and Cronk.

There is not a posse like them anywhere in the country. Or in any country.

You can throw up any name you like on the playing list from the past 14 years, even Greg Inglis, and if you remove them from the roster the Storm continue to have their success.

But not these four. Their respect for each other is immeasurable. Their magic is they are irreplaceable.

Remove just one of these four pillars and the structure is not only weak, the empire falls down.

That’s what it took for Cronk to get to this decision he made. He knew what he was walking away from but says he could not wait any longer.

Melbourne halfback Cooper Cronk is saying farewell to the Storm. Picture: AAP

And the reason why might be enough to make a young boy’s eyes glaze over.

His fiancee Tara Rushton sits about two long passes from where I sit as I write this and she smiled warmly when she heard Cronk speak of their love.

Could it have waited? He says no.

He signed his contract with Melbourne last year, a one-year deal with a one-year option in his favour.

Given they have dated nearly three years a reasonable question, for some, anyway, was why they couldn’t have waited one more. A city asked it on Tuesday.

Melbourne Storm halfback Cooper Cronk has twice won the Dally M medal. Picture: AAP

Time moves differently, though, depending where you are in life.

Cronk is 33 and engaged to a woman who lives in another state who has her own career, which flourishes, and her own commitments.

These are layers in their relationship that became clear to Cronk only once they began dating and he began planning his future.

This is a man, remember, who leaves nothing to chance. Until now, life was all about football. Nothing got in that way.

But now he has dinner with teammates and he sits at their table and with this new view of life he sees not just his teammates but their wives and their children and it reminds him more than ever of what he is continuing to delay.

It is a side we don’t see when he runs out each weekend.

We don’t see him go home and climb into bed by himself or wake up with nobody to say good morning to or to share a conversation over breakfast. It became his slow water torture.

How long does a man have to live like this, his life is on hold?

It all led to Tuesday’s announcement.

It could have been better timed for the Storm, undefeated after five rounds and days out from Sunday’s grand final rematch with Cronulla at AAMI Park, which now promises to be a circus.

But it had to happen at some time and now Cronk will sit down and work through options as the Sydney clubs come calling. Cronk knows it is a shifting landscape.

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He witnessed that when he danced with moving to Sydney before this current contract. He watched the conversation change within days as clubs teased and tempted and now it is all about to begin again.

What’s different this time is the small hole in Cronk’s heart is filled, so who are we to stand in their way?

What else can you say but well done.

And if I am Josh Reynolds, I am signing my contract with the Bulldogs ASAP.