I lived for most of my adult life in North Queensland and so came to detest the Cowboys with a passion that is a deep as the oceans and as irrational as Donald Trump.
Not that I ever made the mistake of believing that they were a crummy football team, however. I know they are a talented bunch of players.
I just really dislike their style of play. Their kick-it-high, rapid play-the-ball, fast running, long backline style of play has never appealed to me and I think has had a negative effect on the game.
If Johnathan Thurston had never entered rugby league then I think the game would be far better than it is today. Thurston and his ilk have tried to turn the ground hugging beauteous thuggery of the game I love into a pale imitation of the Toff’s tournament that is union.
I am a Manly supporter. I didn’t pick the team – they picked me. At the age of five I was taken from a nearby Aunties house to Belmore Oval, to watch my first game of league. Then sitting on the long low hill crowded madly committed Manly supporters I watched them get thrashed by the Roosters.
Although this was fifty years ago I can still remember the smell of the recently cut grass and the passion of the spectators who stayed to watch the thrashing right until the final whistle, then lingered for long enough to dissect the game and declare it an aberration that would be soon be avenged.
Halfway through the game I found myself screaming abuse at the Chookies and in support of the mighty Eagles and I haven’t stopped for these many years.
On that hill so many years ago, that five year old who would eventually grow up to become me absorbed the fundamental rule that guides every committed NRL supporter: you support your team with your heart – not your head.
I don’t mean that you don’t think about the game or become expert in the rules or learn about who is playing where and why, but rather that all of these things are incidental and supplemental to your passion for the game.
When your team is in a furious battle upon the field of dreams then their heartache and failures are your heartaches and failures.
Their victories are your victories. Your team is the best team not because they are the best players or because they are successful, but because you have risen and fallen with them through thick and thin – regardless of the outcome of each individual battle.
On that hill, so many years ago, I learnt that being a one-eyed and utterly partisan supporter is one of the great vicarious thrills available in our modern world. It provides you with the ability to be a gladiator in the arena and to taste blood in your mouth as well as sweet victory.
I have never been able to trust a fair-weather fan or a switch-hitter. Certainly I look askance at anyone who professes to barrack for more than one team or none at all.
Manly is my team. I own them and they own me. And the team I love to hate the most is the Cowboys, closely followed by the Broncos and any Queensland State of Origin team that has ever been picked.
So when the Cowboys and Manly lined up in Townsville for their Round 3 fixture I was locked into my lounge room with the phone off the hook and the cat blindfolded and gagged. My wife was provided with strict instructions to only call the authorities if she saw actual flames consuming the doorway and to ignore the sound of the gnashing of teeth or any wails of despair.
My whole week has been aglow since. The manly team played like the heroes that I know that they are and Thurston’s failure was honey on my lips. The game was balanced and pregnant with potential right up until the 40-20 kick from Daly Cherry-Evans, that was then followed by a running grubber and brilliant try from big Jorge Taufua.
At half time, while making a cup of tea, I even dared to believe that this might be the Manly of my dreams and memory returning from the 80s to make me walk tall for a whole week at a time.
Walker kicked brilliantly throughout. Every time he lined up I would tell myself that it hardly mattered that he was going to miss – but he proved me wonderfully pessimistic at every kick.
At 14 points ahead, I braced myself for a close finish.
Then for virtually the rest of the match the Cowboys camped in the Eagles 20 metres and launched raid after failed raid being held up twice and thoroughly demolished constantly.
It was the sort of heroic effort that the Greeks put in when they stood shoulder to shoulder on the pass at Thermopylae.
The last 30 heroic and wonderful minutes of the game were topped off nicely by Shaun Lane’s great run against the play and Jackson Hastings’ finish.
The end result was 30 glorious points versus 8 ignominious and faltering points. Thurston defeated. The Cowboys shamed. Manly triumphant.
My heart thundering loudly and proudly!
Footy just doesn’t get better than that!
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