With Nathan Cleary touted as the ’Future of NSW’, the Blues’ draft and dump culture must end

SINCE 2006 no less than 19 NSW halves have been condemned to a Blue graveyard. So what does all this mean for Nathan Cleary? Aka the future of NSW Origin? Again, asks Nick Walshaw.

Is Nathan Cleary The Chosen One?

TERRY Campese still remembers taking that call from The Footy Show.

It was Thursday morning. Only hours after his NSW debut.

“And me,” he recalls, “still on an Origin high.”

So even though his Blues had lost the 2009 series opener, Campese said, sure, he would be a guest later that evening. Why not?

Still only 24, this rising Canberra playmaker was the future of Origin, they said. A Blue worth building around.

And had that right boot of Jarryd Hayne not so famously — and contentiously — been ruled to have touched the sideline early in the Etihad Stadium match ... well, Campo would likely have finished the night a winner anyway.

Is Nathan Cleary The Chosen One?

And so with all this in mind, the new Blue appeared on Channel Nine that evening. He kicked back, ready for a few soft questions.

“But Phil Gould, he gave it me,” Campese says with a laugh, nine years on. “I’m sitting there and Gus is saying how I hadn’t run enough. How I hadn’t kicked well or passed enough to Michael Jennings.

“I ended up feeling like shit.

“Then when I got back home to Canberra, it kept going. I was getting blamed everywhere.

“Your family, they get caught up in it, too. So it’s tough.

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“Nobody knew Jennings had done his calf that night; was limping around unable to do much of anything in the second half. And had Haynsey’s foot not gone into touch, we probably would’ve won (Queensland prevailed, 28-18).

“But still, you’re copping it. And then when people suddenly decide ‘OK he was the wrong call, don’t ever play him again’ ... yeah, that’s when your confidence goes.”

So what does all this mean for Nathan Cleary? Aka the future of NSW Origin? Again.

A rising Penrith halfback who — you may have already heard — will tonight be thrust back into the Blues halfback race via a showdown with a Wests Tigers side coached by his old man, Ivan.

With only 20 days until the 2018 Origin opener in Melbourne, Cleary isn’t simply being talked up as the No. 1 contender for this year’s series — but the next 10 of them. Maybe more.

Terry Campese played a lone Origin match.

Which is a problem. Just ask Campese. Or Peter Wallace.

Ask Braith Anasta, Jamie Soward, even Jarrod Mullen. You know, that young Novocastrian hailed the future of NSW Origin in 2007. Again. Aged 20. For all of 80 minutes.

Indeed, for so long was Mullen followed by that shadow of his one Origin failure, by the end he avoided even stories talking up a recall.

Like in 2014, when playing for NSW Country, and the Knights playmaker asked The Daily Telegraph if he could be kept out of a photo shoot with City rival Josh Reynolds.

He explained how, you know, it had now been seven years since his sole Origin game. Which meant seven years of comeback stories. Each one with accompanying picture. Which was probably enough, eh?

And Mullen was right. It was enough.

Yet still, that halfback once hailed the next Joey Johns eventually agreed to a picture anyway.

For while his career may have finished in controversy, Mullo was a champion bloke.

Jarrod Mullen was haunted by the Blues Origin curse.

Same deal with Campo, a Queanbeyan Council employee who League Central tracked down this week — aged 34 and still playing bush footy on those unluckiest of knees.

Quizzed on being okay to discuss that briefest of Origin careers, Campese cackles: “Mate, it’s been almost a decade ... so yes, I’m finally sweet with it.”

Righto.

So what then does he make of all the talk about Cleary? Does the retired Raider shudder when hearing that “Future of NSW” tag being revived?

“Ah, I think you’re talking about someone who is going to be a lot better than me,” Campese says. “Nathan Cleary is a great young player. And an Origin player.

“But I will say that if you’re going to dub him the future of NSW, fine. But if we then go and lose that first game this year, or even if Cleary has a shocker, don’t throw him to the wolves.

“Because as a footballer, that’s when it gets hard. Really hard.

“I understand people are passionate about Origin. And that fans, given they pay their money, are entitled to say whatever they like about you.

“But not being given a second chance to prove myself, I found that hard.

“When you’re trying to get back in knowing that (selectors) don’t want a bar of you ... that’s tough.”

And still, NSW keep doing it anyway.

Truly, for how many years have we rolled out the figures accompanying this yarn?

Explaining how since 2006, the Blues have churned through 19 halves and 20 different combinations — among them Jamie Lyon, Matt Moylan, Adam Reynolds, even Greg Bird.

But Queensland? Well, they rolled into last year’s series having used just six. And even then, Maroons megastars Darren Lockyer, Johnathan Thurston and Cooper Cronk made up 86 per cent of the games.

So while Queensland piles up wins, NSW piles up corpses.

And now arrives another newbie in Cleary. At 20, he’s the same age Mullen was when Blues selectors catapulted him, with only 31 NRL games under his belt, into the 2007 series opener ahead of rivals Craig Gower, Brett Kimmorley and Matt Orford.

The burden is expected to fall on Nathan Cleary.

And that one, the Blues lost 25-18 in Brisbane.

Mullen then missed Origin II with a torn calf, before ending his season prematurely in July with a dislocated shoulder. He never wore sky blue again.

Which has us asking, not for the first time, if maybe the NSW halves are cursed?

Sure, it sounds impossible. But so did one State winning eight Origin series straight. Or 11 of the past dozen.

Yet consider that even in 2014, when the curse seemed to lift with Cronk sidelined, it was the Blues’ unluckiest halfback Mitchell Pearce who himself missed out with suspension.

Just as Pearcey again finds himself sidelined for the 2018 series, this time with injury, Queensland plays without recent retirees Cronk, Thurston and Cameron Smith.

“So maybe we run the halves out in jerseys 18 and 19,” Campese says with a grin.

Which isn’t the worst idea we’ve ever heard.

And as for Cleary? “Play him,” the Queanbeyan favourite adds. “And stick with him. That way, Nathan Cleary really can be the future for NSW.”

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