Risk of more pain if Jets not ready for game of their lives

Leading that misery is Tweed fullback Lindon McGrady who has a habit of inflicting pain on Ipswich.

MAGIC MILESTONE: Jet Huskie Teutau is about to join Ipswich's 100 club. Picture: Rob Williams

JETS BUZZ

TWEED are like the girl on the bus you are keen about but she is never nice to you and makes fun of red hair.

Tweed are coming to Ipswich again to cause pain on Sunday and end the Jets' bus ride for 2019.

Leading that misery is Tweed fullback Lindon McGrady who has a habit of inflicting pain on Ipswich.

Earlier this year, he kicked 10 points over for the Seagulls in their win over the Jets.

Last season he kicked the goal after full-time that won the Seagulls the game and broke hearts.

"You guys don't make it easy for me," McGrady laughed.

"We are not dissimilar to the Jets. We have to win and if we do that we are aiming for a home final.

"The Jets are a difficult road trip and I am glad it's an afternoon game and not a cold night.''

Tweed will come to Ipswich with the Jets needing to win four games in a row to play in the finals.

Tweed are ahead of the Jets in seventh place on 20 points. The Jets are in ninth on 16 points.

The overall record between these two clubs has the Tweed winning 21 to Ipswich's 14.

The Jets have won eight of the past nine games against the Tweed in Ipswich. Overall, in Ipswich the Jets hold the advantage over the Tweed Seagulls 11 wins to five.

Tweed beat Ipswich 32-24 earlier this year. The last time the Jets played Tweed in Ipswich it was a day out for the Jets 52-16 in 2018.

Tweed had a win at Ipswich in 2016 when they upended the Jets 22-16 with Seagulls fullback Alex Grant scoring three tries before half time.

This game was an abnormally. The weather was so bad on the coast they moved the game to Ipswich and Tweed played the Jets twice in Ipswich in 2016.

Tweed are coming off a loss to the Cutters while the Jets are still thinking about what could have been against the Devils.

The last time the Jets played Tweed Jayden Connors scored under the posts. The Jets will need some of that enterprise again this week.

Connors has scored four tries this year to take his career tally in the Intrust Super Cup to 14 from 45 games for the Jets.

"Last weekend was good for us to rest up and recover from a few little injuries,'' Connors said. "But we just have to come together and treat every game like our last because obviously our season is on the line.

"Personally I'm not nervous and don't think any of the boys are either. We are a pretty relaxed team.

"We just have to regroup at training each week.

"If anything we are excited about the last four games to get the wins and make the finals.

Huskie's hundred achievement

HUSKIE Teutau will play his 100th game for the Jets on Sunday.

He made his debut in 2015 off the bench against Easts. He will be the 15th Jet to play 100 games.

My enduring image of Huskie is sitting on the bus to Lang Park for the 2015 grand final Huskie calmly reading his bible, a man at peace with whatever would transpire that afternoon but a player that was ready.

Huskie played a massive 48 minutes off the bench in the grand final after Kurt Capewell was injured and made 25 tackles. Every single one of them hurt the Blackhawks.

Huskie is a great story of perseverance he played in Fassifern's 2012 IRL premiership and then came along to Jets to have a crack at playing ISC.

Ipswich Jets co-coach Shane Walker took a while to be impressed but Huskie won him over in the end.

"The pre-season consisted of three half hour sessions run concurrently and rotated every half hour," Shane said.

"All of the new guys would be made to do fitness for all three rotations, bearing in mind one session is extremely demanding and if they pull out or quit then they were no longer allowed back.

"Huskie turned up on day one weighing 115kg and wearing a jumper, temperature was 30 plus degrees, it appeared as if he wasn't going to last long.

"Monday came and went, and he 'survived', Wednesday the same Friday was completed and somehow still wearing the jumper he turned up in, he'd 'survived' again.

"Nine fitness sessions in three days with a jumper on, surely, he will not be back next week.

"To our surprise he was. Monday, Wednesday, Friday, nine session in three days, jumper on and most of the newbies that had attended day one were no longer around.

"When the same process played out the following week our surprise had now gone to amazement and when the same thing happened the following week our amazement had turned to admiration.

"Huskie and his jumper were still there but his 115kg frame had now dropped below 100 kg.

"After five weeks of slog only Huskie and his mate Aaron Angareu remained.

"The first time we saw him do an opposed session he caught the ball, ran across field, dummied, stepped left, stepped right, skipped high in the air and did a little jig Michael Flatly would be proud of and in that instance we knew we had something special.

"Ben and I gave each other a look that did not require words. By the start of the season, Huskie was down to 93kg.

"He was in great shape and more importantly had proven to his teammates that he had great physical and mental resilience.

"As the season wore on his speed, strength and footwork gave the team great impact in 20 to 30 minute bursts off the bench.

"By season's end, on grand final day all of Huskie's never give in attitude was called upon and relied on when we lost Kurt Capewell 30 minutes into the game.

"Fifty minutes straight in the ruck was never going to be an issue to a bloke that had spent hours in the heat of summer doing nine fitness sessions a week in jumper. A state final and a national final was a great reward for his hard work."

Favourite memory

MY favourite Huskie memory in his 99 games is Sunshine Coast at home last year.

The Falcons were up 22-12 at halftime and the Jets needed to start the second half well.

Enter Huskie.

The Jets are 15 metres out and Jayden Connors goes to dummy half, Huskie one off the ruck and just barrels them out of the way between Harry Grant and three other Falcons forwards straight beside the posts for his third ever try.

The Jets then had a dominate 15 minutes scoring three tries and going from six points behind to 10 points in front.

Huskie had taken the game back for the Jets and Ipswich went on to win 32-28. It was classic Huskie - calm, leadership and strong actions when needed.

One hundred games for the Jets is a terrific feat and lots of people contribute to a player achieving this milestone.

Huskie had to persist and find his path to the Jets.

"I have to thank Isi Hafoka if it wasn't for him I wouldn't be here in Australia and I brought David Tahavalu and Aaron Angerau with me," Huskie said.

"The O'Connell family who are my family for taking us in to pursue the next step which was Ipswich Jets.

"Special thanks is reserved for my family the Boziers and Tracy and Stu Neuendorf as well as my Crossfit family who keep me fit and on the field.

Jets pointscoring machine Marmin Barba. Picture: Cordell Richardson

Marmin closes on West's record

THE great Marmin Barba is on the precipice of another Jets record.

Barba needs 33 points to have the most points ever for the Jets.

At the moment Barba is on 562 points for the Jets, behind number one Steve West on 594.

West played 79 games scoring 34 tries and booting 228 goals and two field goals.

Barba currently sits on 89 games with 76 tries and 129 goals.

Barba already set the record last season for most tries for the Jets (76).

The Jets record for points in a game is 28 which West also has from 2003 against Souths.

Marmin could knock that over and get the points record against Tweed.

Two Jets records against his former club Tweed has an appealing sound to it.

Cooper's stat

THE Jets have scored 17 tries from kicks this season. That's 27% coming off the boot.

A cold beer with . . .

In 1998 when I was younger and cooler, I went to see Powderfinger play at Festival Hall. My wife and I had one of our earliest dates to the farewell Powderfinger tour. Until 2010, John Collins would be the bassline for much of my life. I pulled open the guitar case, put on a black t-shirt, shouted are you ready to rock Ipswich and sat down to talk league with JC.

Who was the best league player in Powderfinger? Cogsie and I were both from country regions where league is king. I probably told everyone I was the best but Cogsie was probably better than I was because he had a great tackle. If Hoggie chose to play league he would have been unstoppable.

What do you love about rugby league? The pace of the game and I think it's so brutal. Live in particular because you can hear the hits.

Do you have a league hero from your childhood? Chris Close would have been my biggest hero. He was a Beaudesert boy and I loved watching him play for Queensland, the Redcliffe Dolphins and even Manly. I love Choppy Close.

I have seen a photo of you playing in theBeaudesert Kingfishers jumper. What's your earliest League memory? I played for the Kingfishers from the age of eight until I went to school in Brisbane at the age of 14. My fondest memory is being a part of the under 13's undefeated premiers team when we won the grand final against Runaway Bay 43-0, playing against amazing players that I respected like Brett Horsnell. I remember like it was yesterday having a great side that year and a great childhood friend of mine, Andrew Gee, gifted me two tries that game. We had an awesome football team that year and more importantly we were all great friends. It was such a special time in my life.

Is it true all musicians want to be sportsmen and all sportsmen want to be musicians? I think there is something in that. I have a great respect for all sports and people who excel at them. I find myself using sporting analogies all the time. They sound better than "Let's Rock!" (sometimes).

Originally published as Risk of more pain if Jets not ready for game of their lives