There can be no more excuses, it’s time for young brigade of Blues players to own the result

HAVING lost 10 of the last 11 series, Blues fans are sick of the stench of defeat. There can be no more heroic failures, it’s time for NSW to meet the moment, writes Paul Kent.

ARTHUR Beetson played 17 times for NSW and just twice for Queensland. The first of those is set in bronze.

Beetson’s greatness was there for all to see in that first game with Queensland, his hands taped like a prize-fighter running on to Lang Park.

Beetson was 35 and by then his leadership qualities were well known.

When Origin was finally given the go ahead in 1980 Queensland Rugby League boss Ron McAuliffe called in his selectors and gave them the good news with one simple instruction: “Pick who you want. But Beetson’s captain.”

The great leaders sense the moment.

Some of it was Beetson’s good fortune that night at Lang Park, some was all him. It began when they were announcing teams in jumper order and after No. 10, Rod Morris, was introduced, the crowd swelled into a low roar.

Laurie Daley has plenty on his shoulders. By Boo Bailey.

But they were being teased. The ground announcer skipped Beetson at 11 and called out No 12, Johnny Lang.

Beetson, the captain, was saved to last.

“The greatest sound that I’ve ever experienced,” Wally Lewis says now, before pausing. “It was a oncer ...”

Beetson took it all and turned it into the white fury that is Queensland.

Where Beetson got lucky was those around him.

Wally Lewis was just 20 that night. Significantly, he was not yet Wally Lewis. He was a club footballer from Queensland, thrown in at lock because North Sydney’s Alan Smith was preferred at five-eighth.

Arthur Beetson, Wally Lewis and a dejected Ray Price leave the field after Origin 1.

Mal Meninga had his 20th birthday the day of the game. He was a young centre from Souths Brisbane and not yet Mal Meninga.

Chris Close was 21 and also anonymous. He got man of the match. Colin Scott was 20.

Lewis and Meninga would go on to greatness, Close and Scott would prove themselves two of Queensland’s greatest players. On their backs Queensland was built.

Beetson’s good fortune that night was running on with four talented young men who were not old enough to witness Queensland ever winning an interstate series but who had a fire in them that burned white-hot. He recognised this gift of accidental timing and, always a leader, decided to feed it and so what happened next was all his.

He swung an arm at Mick Cronin, sparking a brawl.

He gave Graeme Wynn a small touch-up in another brawl. He sensed those young Queenslanders would respond only one way, which they did.

They followed.

Who’s up for the challenge as NSW head into a new era. Coach Laurie Daley with David Klemmer and Blake Ferguson.

It set a standard Queensland still owns. Lewis maintained that rage for more than a decade.

Laurie Daley is often spoken about as NSW’s greatest Origin captain. Again, it was the sense of timing.

Daley had an ability to recognise when extra was needed.

It was the tough run, the big hit nobody saw coming. NSW had already won the series in 1996 when, less than a minute into game three, Daley sent a message to his teammates that this was no dead rubber.

Andrew Gee hit the ball up off a tap and Daley came out of the line at left centre and floored him. Great leaders recognise the moment.

“You sense that responsibility,” Daley says. He is in camp with the Blues now, their coach, thinking leadership and opportunity.

LISTEN! David Riccio, Dean Ritchie and Fatima Kdouh have the inside word on what is happening at Camp Blues and give their reasons why NSW will win against a Maroons team in turmoil.

“If something needs to be done,’ he says, “then you’ve got to be the bloke that does it.”

After a decade of failure the Blues have come to the end of their excuses. The greatness of the current Queensland roster is no longer there.

Queensland go into Wednesday’s opener without Johnathan Thurston, Greg Inglis and Billy Slater, all spoken about as possible Immortals.

Matt Scott is injured and Corey Parker is retired and Nate Myles is down on form.

So often the Blues have gone into a game on the other side of good fortune. Now, the odds have tipped their way. It is not enough to get close, anymore.

We get to see what these modern Blues are made of on Wednesday.

Great leaders have great timing. They sense opportunity.

While there is no Beetson among them, no Daley either, there is a core of young men who would be hard pressed to find a football memory where Queensland did not dominate Origin.

Queensland has won 10 of the past 11 series. Does the fire burn inside them like it did inside Lewis, Meninga, Close and co?

Daley, now coaching NSW, is looking to for his leader.

Plenty will be resting on Boyd Cordner’s shoulders but the responsibility won’t be all his. Pic Brett Costello

Boyd Cordner is captain on the team sheet but the responsibility is not all his. The night Daley took down Gee, Brad Fittler was the Blues captain.

Part of Daley’s struggle is the difference between recognising the moment from the coach’s box and getting the action done.

“You’ve got to pick the right player to actually get it done,” he says. “It’s a judgment. Who do you think is the right bloke to be able to inspire? If you need anything extra done you will try to send out a message.”

Daley is doing his best but the system is flawed. Play changes in the time in between.

At some point these new Blues need to own their result. They need to recognise it on the field and capitalise. Like Beetson, like those Queenslanders all those years ago, they need to realise right now, beginning Wednesday, they have the greatest gift of all.

Opportunity does not wait to be asked.

AND THE WINNER IS ...

INCREASINGLY, it seems just one will survive in the growing battle between ARL commissioner John Grant and his chief executive Todd Greenberg, but don’t be surprised if both emerge intact.

All week Greenberg and Grant have put out alternative versions of the latest funding debacle, each seemingly blaming the other for the clubs’ frustration for reneging on the promised funding.

It stepped up when Greenberg explained the game’s cashflow problems to the clubs on Monday, telling them why the game needed to withdraw the guaranteed funding promised earlier.

Then came Grant’s late-night email that night distancing himself from any knowledge. He called in fellow commissioner Tony McGrath to have “direct oversight” over Greenberg as he tries to make the numbers work.

Yet there is rumoured to be a “paper trail” of emails showing Grant was certainly aware of the financial position Greenberg put to club bosses on Monday, in direct conflict to Grant’s claims.

If there is a trail, how is Grant’s position tenable after his claims?

Clubs don’t know, either, but they believe he will find a way to stay on.

The latest is Grant was not so much not informed as “disappointed” with the way Greenberg presented the information.

BROWNE ON ROAD TO REDEMPTION

MUHAMMAD Ali would get so paranoid about being nobbled before a fight he would fill his water bottles, tape the seal ... then return later and empty them, only to fill them again and seal them again.

It is a lesson Lucas “Big Daddy” Browne failed to get when, he says, he was nobbled in Russia in a fight that saw him stripped of the WBA world heavyweight title when he tested positive for drugs.

Now the long road to redemption begins at Club Punchbowl next Friday when Browne steps back into the ring against Matthew Greer, a fight he should win without raising too much of a sweat.