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A Good Friday backyard barbecue and yesterday’s NRL smorgasbord convinced me further of one thing: the undervalued art of catching and holding a football.
In a day and age where we worship setting the PB – the monster squat, the epic deadlift, the beastly bench press and the blistering 40m split – you wonder if the focus has drifted from what truly matters.
I suspect part of it has to do with our deification of the perfect gym bod and our love of the easily quantifiable, but exceptional fundamentals don’t get nearly enough credit.
We make a song and dance about metres gained and tackles made, but why don’t we widely publicise the catch:drop ratio or pass accuracy percentage of our game’s leading lights?
This train of thought began on the drive to my sister’s house, with the radio tuned into the Bulldogs-Rabbitohs game.
In commentary was former international winger Wendell Sailor, berating Bulldogs flyer Marcel Montoya for failing to pluck a misdirected pass in prime field position.
‘It was behind him, not the best of passes, but this is the NRL and it’s your job to take those’ was the gist of Sailor’s argument.
It was a tough-but-fair call from someone who knows the ruthless expectations of executing at the elite level.
Also tucked among the superlatives about the bash-and-barge on display, the same broadcast team momentarily cast a shadow over the ball security of Sam and George Burgess.
The Burgess brothers, for all intents and purposes, have just about everything else going for them that a coach could dream about.
But are we guilty of waxing lyrical about the game’s powerhouses, then merely brushing off their handling errors which ultimately prove more decisive?
Upon arrival at my sister’s house, it was a delight to see a yard teeming with children of all ages.
There was one kid there, an eight-year-old bag of bones who would be lucky to be 30kg.
As we stood around in a group, passing a football in a game of hot potato, I noticed that no matter how inaccurate, weak or strong the others passed him the ball, he caught it with the minimum of fuss.
Without making it obvious, I started testing him with a variety of styles – floaters, spinning into his chest, spinning away from his chest, end-over-end balls.
He didn’t bat an eyelid and just kept at it.
Catch, pass. Catch, pass. Ad nauseam without a hint of distraction.
As well as being slightly envious of his ability, I stored it away for future reference.
Later, when the welcoming chit-chat was done and it was decided we’d play a backyard game of touch footy, I drew the short straw.
“You’re the oldest, so you get one less player on your team,” was the rationale from the hosts.
“Okay, but I get to pick him,” I retorted, pointing to the junior flyweight.
The others, including kids twice his age and size, looked sidewards at each other in bemusement and shrugged.
“Sure.”
The way the game panned out purposefully played to that kid’s strengths.
Down one player, we drew multiple defenders, shifted the ball quickly, held width in attack, created space to kick to isolated wingers.
When he was the linkman, little bag-o-bones could be relied on to get the ball where it needed to be 10 times out of 10. When he stood wide and found space, he was faultless in receiving the ball and planting it over the tryline under pressure. When the kick went in his direction, he’d catch it on the full or, alternatively, pounce on the scraps left by others.
By comparison, the bigger kids played free-and-easy, committing simple errors, over-playing their hand, dropping the ball on the way to the tryline.
They negated every single advantage they held by ignoring the holy trinity of catch-carry-pass.
And at an Easter barbecue, in a game bounded by a trampoline, washing line, cubby house and tool shed, they allowed the youngest and smallest kid to outwit and outpoint them.
When the Broncos-Titans fixture began on the TV shortly after, there was further emphasis on the importance of fundamentals.
Tyronne Roberts-Davis failed to grasp a rolling ball in-goal that could have asserted the Titans early dominance; Alex Glenn coughed up a ball as he plunged over for the Broncos.
For all the good things he did in the game, and his mass of Supercoach points, James Roberts committed a series of pass mistakes tinged by impatience and inaccuracy.
English import Dan Sarginson, who we are still to see the best of, had a shocker with his hands that he’ll be keen to forget.
Either side could have put the result to bed much earlier with decent ball security.
The tragedy for fans of the fundamentals will be that Milford’s game-turning try will be replayed over the coming week with emphasis on the way he and Roberts finished off, not the fact it started from a clean and skillful catch of a kick at point-blank range.
Andrew McCullough will be credited with 50+ tackles, but it was a terrible pass he took around his ankles in the dying minutes that kept his team in the ascendancy.
Bicep curls may get the girls, weights may indeed still get the dates, but even in 2017 catches are still winning matches.
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