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MANCHESTER – How do you write a tops and flops column on an 84-0 win? It’s hard to think of too many negatives from Friday night in Coventry, given the scoreline, the superb performances from several debutants and the late try, which is one of the best you’ll ever see at a Rugby League World Cup.
Even the obvious downside to the performance – the quality of the opposition – is a little hard to poke at given the structural limitations at play.
Scotland aren’t the force they used to be, and there’s a whole column in there about the state of rugby league north of Hadrian’s Wall, but let’s be real: they’re a side of mostly part-timers playing the bloody Kangaroos. What did you expect?
With that in mind, here’s a wave of positivity on this Australia team.
It’s hard to look further than the halfback to start. Cleary had three try assists within the first half hour and nearly broke the Aussie record for most points on debut. It was superlative stuff.
In the sheds afterwards, he said he was unaware of Andrew Johns’ record from 1995, and that must be true: one expects that he would have blown up at the forward pass call that robbed him of a try under the sticks, and likely he’d have made a better fist of the late conversion that could have equalled Joey.
It lost us our big headline, too. Imagine the hype if Cleary’s debut had matched the greatest halfback of the modern age. If you hate the Panthers, and a lot of people do, it would have become nearly unbearable. Mal might have even had to pick him again.
Pat Carrigan is usually in the honest toiler category. He might be the most elite honest toiler, the sort of guy you want in the trenches. You’d take a pack filled with Pats. That’s why he won the Man of the Series in Origin.
His fortitude on the field is never in doubt, but the way that he put the tragedy of the death of his mate Liam Hampson behind him is an entirely different kind of strength.
Speaking the morning after, he explained that he wanted to show up for the family and friends of his pal, and to pay back the love shown to him by his Kangaroos teammates at a time when, frankly, playing rugby league was probably not a high priority in his life.
It’s a reminder that the players are just young guys a long way from home with a bunch of blokes thrown together because they’re good at footy.
That sort of reaction from the team, and from Carrigan back to them, and from Carrigan to the Hampson family, is not something we should take for granted.
(Photo by Michael Steele/Getty Images)
We have to find a flop and the best I can do is Coventry itself. Not the town, of course, which perfectly nice, but the choice of venue for this game was confusing and didn’t really work.
The macro purpose of this tournament is to grow the game, so it makes sense to play in non-rugby league areas, and doubtless the local authorities in Coventry bid a lot of money for the right to have the Kangaroos in their city.
But, in the time since these things were announced, a lot has changed. The pandemic delayed the tournament by a year, which was inconvenient for the organisers and also appears to have cost them in attendances, because people who bought expecting one date are not always able to attend.
Secondly, with the rate of inflation running above 10% and the cost of living spiralling, I would bet a significant sum that a lot of ticket purchasers paid in 2020 but then decided against travelling to Coventry because their financial situation is worse.
They announced 10,000 or so, but I doubt it was completely accurate. The organisers might have sold 10,000 tickets, but there were not that many people there. I guess selling tickets is the point but it didn’t look great nonetheless.
The choice of fixture did seem strange. As we saw in Leeds last week, diehard rugby league people will pay good money to see the Kangaroos, because they know who Latrell Mitchell is and want to see him play. That simply isn’t true in Coventry.
The draw in the Midlands is that it’s a World Cup game, and that could have been sold regardless of participants. When Tonga play the Cook Islands in Middlesbrough, that will be the draw.
This game could have been Ireland v Lebanon – Cov has a huge Irish population, too – and you could have sold out Leigh Sports Village, where that game was held on Sunday, for the Kangaroos.
The question ‘why are we in Coventry for this?’ was asked more than once in the media box ahead of the game. Looking back, I’m not sure we ever got an answer.
Those that did turn up were treated to one of the moments of the tournament, indeed of any tournament, or any Kangaroos game.
In the presser, Mal Meninga was asked to place Josh Addo-Carr’s wonder try on a list of the greatest ever in the green and gold and, while he joked that it might sit behind some of his own in the pantheon, it is certainly right up there.
It was one of the transcendently brilliant, instantly shareable moments that World Cups thrive upon.
Nobody will remember or care that it was against Scotland, because it could have been against anyone, and if Matt Burton and Addo-Carr had done it against no-one on the training paddock, it would have still been improbable.
There’s been a hierarchy of great tries at this tournament. Greece have only managed three, total, but all have wild and chaotic chip and chases, the sort of score you need to pull off if you’re a massive underdog (and have Billy Magoulias in the side).
England have scored some belters too, with Dom Young swerving past Joseph Suaalii at Newcastle likely to live long in the memory as the moment when fans of the home nation realised that, no, this was actually happening.
The razzle dazzle Tonga score to win the game against the Kumuls – with a prop forward, Siasiua Taukieaho kicking for Keoan Koloamatangi – was perfect because it was a moment of brilliant madness to win a brilliantly mad game.
But they all pale into nothingness beside Burto and the Foxx. The between the legs pass was both hilarious and athletic, the intuition to catch, turn and hack on was even better and then the pace to get to the ball before it went dead was supreme.
It’s what fans wake up at 5am for. It’s what sent the largely non-RL crowd in Coventry home happy. Can you tell that I enjoyed it?