Wayne Bennett gets a lot of things right. He got it completely and utterly right on Sunday.
I am not referring to how he coached the Knights on a hot Sunday afternoon at Hunter Stadium against the fellow winless team Cronulla, though the scoreline suggests he got that near perfect.
No, Bennett was right about something far more important – it is hard to say the right things about the circumstances around the Alex McKinnon situation.
The afternoon of 30 March 2014 in Newcastle had a somewhat Dickensian feel about it, in the ‘best of times, worst of times’ kind of way.
It was an afternoon when sport mattered not, but it somehow mattered more than ever. When the result was not important, but the result was important in a way previously unknown.
It was an afternoon when a crowd of 18,000 was good, but the crowd was only 18,000 and far more disappointing than the 9,000 who turned up on a rain-soaked afternoon to watch the Titans last year.
The truth is I still do not know what to make of the Knights’ performance against Cronulla.
From a pure numbers point of view, if you are going to make a statement to the competition that you will overcome tragedy and separate yourself from the bottom of the table, then a 30-0 thumping said a lot about the character of the Knights players 1 to 18 (minus the retired 16).
As 18,000 Novocastrians and a handful of Sharks supporters stood as one with a stirring round of applause before kick off, a match day that had previously been abundantly and clearly different was now ethereal, mystical and completely out of this world.
As Wayne Bennett strode to the middle of the ground, to embrace his other sons and stand in unity with them, there were hairs standing up on your neck, goosebumps shimmering over your body and tears welling up in your eyes.
Then the game kicked off and the crowd went quiet. Deathly and eerily quiet.
The Knights players scored tries, BJ Lulia bagging three of them. I am led to believe that Tryone Roberts was a fantasy league super star.
The crowd roared the ‘Newcastle’ chant, which would surge and fade periodically throughout the game.
Yet every tackle that appeared marginally high, or awkward, could not stop you from momentarily holding your breath. Tryone Roberts seemed to have his head torn off shortly after he kicked to the in goal, and the crowd wanted to vent their anger, almost wanting to protect their own, like a mother lion protecting her cub.
You had to feel sorry for Cronulla.
It is easy to say that you could see this result coming, but of course you could not have seen this coming. Melbourne had seemed to have the impact of the week’s events stop them in their tracks as Canterbury pounded them in the west.
In the east, Cronulla ended up being the sacrificial lamb presented to the masses to allow a city and its players to bask in a cathartic 80 minute purging away of a week of anguish, confusion and pain. A week of the seemingly endless gut-wrenching sensation of watching footage that exhibited anguish and fear cross Alex McKinnon’s face immediately after that tackle.
Sunday was an afternoon where Newcastle, maybe even rugby league supporters in general, were begging to be reminded that they were allowed to enjoy the game and that they needed to feel good about themselves.
Wayne Bennett’s article in The Sunday Telegraph only added to the sentiment of the most mournful of celebrations.
Alex McKinnon was simply more than just another player. Whether that was true before or after the trauma of the previous Monday night was irrelevant. Alex McKinnon had ended up being the pick of the litter, the magnetic personality who sparked people to life.
Alex suddenly became a hero, when previously he now appears to have been unappreciated by those not in the know.
On game day, for every image that the big screen displayed of a young, happy and vibrant player with a fiery, wiry lock of red hair, standing strong and proud, you wanted to celebrate everything that he had achieved, while always being mindful and desolate about all that he had lost.
As a crowd, we felt thankful for what we had, whether it was the simple pleasures of life, or being able to enjoy our sporting team performing on our behalf. We felt lost for how easily something so tragic could so easily happen to someone so worthy of a destiny far better than that currently being presented.
Alain de Botton appeared on Triple J earlier last week, to discuss with Tom Tilley the reaction of the world to the missing flight MH370. Interestingly, he commented that when a catastrophic event occurs, the subsequent coverage acts to highlight how something so tragic could indeed happen randomly.
As such, the event brings to you the realisation that, while you are thankful for what you have, you are now indelibly laden with the knowledge and all too real awareness that all that you are indeed thankful for, could be abruptly and randomly taken from you at any instant.
One moment life seems so limitless, the next it seems to limited.
Such was our reaction to Alex McKinnon.
We are happy to walk the streets, drive our cars, jump for joy, hold our partners and caress their bodies. I can type at this keyboard and we can all live our lives unfettered, all in a way that so many simply cannot, largely through no fault of their own.
Suddenly stepping on a bindi-eye or feeling the pain of a papercut on your fingertip at least allowed you to appreciate that your body still functioned to allow you to experience and feel these things.
But thankfulness is abruptly countered by knowing that it could be taken away at any millisecond.
And it was in that regard that the events at Hunter Stadium seemed to matter so little.
Russell Packer is in prison? Willie Mason is a drink driver? Nathan Tinkler’s financial position is dire?
I would wonder if even the Sharks considered whether their on-going supplements dramas seemed to matter little given the physical, spiritual and emotional devastation that had ploughed through the world of rugby league this week.
Well, somehow that and the other supposed tragedies happening in the Knights’ kingdom seemed less significant.
So if you want me to tell you what I made of the Knights seemingly easy win over Cronulla, I simply cannot tell you.
It is the least I have enjoyed a victory that I wanted to enjoy more than any other. It is the hardest I have ever had it, watching the Knights put on a performance for the ages.
And the time for game analysis of how the Knights are travelling simply does not seem like the thing to do right now.
I would struggle to say that I enjoyed a (relatively) packed Hunter Stadium, but nor could I say that I would have allowed myself to be anywhere else.
What will stay with me is the crowd, standing as one and urging their team.
What will stay with me will be witnessing Willie Mason, supposedly in the twilight of his career, putting in one of the most singularly inspiring performances of his stellar, glittering and wastefully controversial career.
What will stay with me will be the memory of a time when the crowd wanted to do whatever it took to protect their own players.
But the image that will never leave me, is the moment that I first noticed a man a few moments before kick off. He was a man you could have mistaken for Clint Eastwood, at the end of one of A Fistful of Dollars or The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, crossing the sideline as if a man unaware of his surroundings, but determined to single-handedly carry his boys to hell and back.
That man was Wayne Bennett, he of Clint Eastwood-esque appearance, in body and character, striding unashamedly and earnestly towards his band of young men.
The emotion of the day will linger, the repercussions will be felt for years.
How the impact of the day’s events will impact the team, its members and the city itself will not be known until long after Alex McKinnon has gone through his own recovery period.
For an afternoon, we all rose as one, for one. In doing so, you were very much aware as to the essential reason why sport had to matter, despite not really mattering at all.
#RiseForAlex
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