So the pre-season is now in full swing. Players are hitting the sand dunes, the beep tests, and the protein shakes, as the 2009 NRL season inches ever nearer, like those zombies in the movies.
And for those of us watching it through the eyes of the press, it is already starting to take a familiar path, just like those zombies in the movies.
The New Year brings optimism for most of us. We range from either celebrating we got through another one or might be genuinely hopeful of a great new year.
Footballers the world over always share this optimism at the start of their new season.
Everyone is always raring to go, the winners are looking to defend their title, the losers are looking for redemption, the injury prone crocks are looking for some time on the paddock, and the serial offenders have conveniently wiped their slate clean and are looking for a fresh start.
In a word: boring!
There is something so predictably tedious about this time of year for the rugby league fan and possibly fans of the other footballing codes that I, and many others, are pushed to the brink of insanity more often than at any other time of the year.
It is just the cocktail of the banality of pre-season predictions from the players themselves, the tedium of not actually having any matches to watch, and the fact that nearly as many words are produced when absolutely nothing is happening, that drives us all mad.
Players are flogged to within an inch of their lives by masochistic trainers, only to be dragged before the waiting media to pronounce ‘We’ve got a real shot this year’, before rambling on about this being the best the side has looked, this being the toughest preseason of their careers. And so on.
Rugby league is about 101 years old, and judging by the last cliché, this pre-season is 101 times harder than the first pre-season (which was incredibly long seeing it lasted for all of the time before the first match).
If things get harder, at the current rate, players are going to need to be tunnelling to the centre of the earth and sculling a pint of molten lava within 20 years (the fattest one doing it in a pink t-shirt).
Some are keener than others.
There seems to have been 500 words dedicated to every passing thought going through Reni Maitua’s mind lately.
And, shock horror, the winner of last year’s award for most expensive sleep-in is looking forward to playing for the Sharks under Ricky Stuart. Headline: ‘Player backs coach that’ll pick him and club that pays him’.
One for the ages.
Just once I’d like a player to say “we are going to get f*cking flogged this year, we were a shambles last year, and it is only going to get worse this year.”
Some honesty would be incredibly refreshing.
And it is not just league.
Jason Culina was at it this week with his “I’m here to win” declaration. Well, hold the front page! Footballer declares he enjoys victory.
It would have been far more entertaining had he said, “This Palmer bloke has more dollars than sense and if he wants to throw some my way to get out of the European winter and bring the kids home, then I’m all for it. Results? Who cares. I’m a 15 minute drive from the Gold Coast casino.”
But my favourite of recent season was when new Newcastle United manager Joe Kinnear declared he had plenty of “telegrams of support” after getting a hammering in the press.
Telegrams? Who the hell sends telegrams these days and who offers the service?!
Not only would it be strange to find one person does it, old Joe seems to have found a whole group of people that still do it, obviously commenting that it is so much faster than the days when runners would be dispatched.
Kinnear was either clearly lying, knows people who own a time machine, or has gone mad.
If it is the latter, I’m not far from joining him this off-season.
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It was like a blast from the past with the Broncos not only dominating on the scoreboard, but shades of past legends.
He wasn't expecting it to get that messy.
Ricky Stuart would be pulling his hair out after a mistake like this.
It had all been going so well. Canberra were by far the better side for ten minutes, with Jamal Fogarty giving the Brisbane back…
Simi Sasagi couldn't believe his luck as he strolled straight past Jaiyden Hunt, who should have made a better attempt at a tackle.
In wet conditions, the Broncos were making it extremely tough for 18-year-old Chevy Stewart in just his second game.
