in the back woods of rugby league

Eternal optimists,

The winter wire is back.
For better or for worse.
The last weekend in September seems like only yesterday, maybe because we are barely a couple of weeks into autumn.
Balmain never had a snowflakes after the week they've had, but no one expected to see the Mighty Tiges at the bottom of the ladder after Round 1.
They've got some work to do.
That's bleedin' obvious.
Did like the contrast of the greenest rookie coach in the caper calling the shots in his very first game .v. the most ancient super coach in the rugby league universe, who's been at the wheel in a zillion matches and won a premiership or seven, just quietly.
Out-smarted, out-played, rolled over and tickled on the tummy.
Back to the drawing board Mr Michael "Mick" Potter [who will be known from here on in as Coach Harry].
Nice enough bloke, who talks sense in quiet measured tones, doesn't take fools lightly, and runs a tight ship, but clearly has a lot of home work to complete by next weekend.
The players, and who can blame them, were all at sea, following the mid-week funeral of the young kiddie Mosese Fotuaika, who was expected to break into the Tigers first grade side this year with a splash after signing a lucrative new contract, but topped himself instead at the age of 20.
The shocking tragedy has sparked some interesting, frank & honest talk in the back woods of rugby league.
It appears the number of young indigenous players coming into the game has dropped off dramatically in recent years as they are overcome by the pressure to perform and pay their dues while being over-run by the sheer bulk and lightning speed of the Islander lads over short distances.
It's patently obvious that the Aboriginal dudes and the Torres Strait guys are better off in Australian Rules, where there are no Islanders at all to compete with, but if they play any kind of professional football they still have to deal with, for them, unbearable demands
The Islander kiddies also come under the same enormous pressure, due mainly to the tribal clan system that requires that they share their fabulous new found wealth with the extended, extended family to the point where they barely have enough money to pay the rent, buy a ham sandwich, and have a couple of beers on Monday night even though they are earning hundreds of thousands of dollars a season.
Who gets what is subject to eternal quarrelling, and those who get nothing for one reason or another, inevitably hate your guts, and you have no control over it.
The clubs are pulling their hair out over it as there is nothing they can seemingly do about it, as most of the boys they get are plucked from South Pacific villages with little education who know nothing else and are patently unsuited to big city life.
To make matters worse, they play with other blokes who see the opportunity of a lifetime right there in front of them, and the sensible ones who are free to invest their excess cash to set themselves up for life while still living a lavish lifestyle in the here and the now.
Some just get to the point where they can't take it anymore.
There was a very sad story of some other kid that was mentioned this week.
He was about the same age as Mosese - can't remember his name or who he played for - who a couple of years back went to his first senior training session seemingly with a glittering career ahead of him and picked up his first grade gear including his jumper with his name and number on the back, went home to his sister's place where was living, put his kit bag on the lounge room floor, kissed her good night and went to bed.
He didn't appear in the morning and everyone in the house thought he was just having a sleep in after a big day, until he didn't show up for lunch, and someone thought to go and have a look in his room, only to find he'd hung himself.
It's clear we are failing the barely literate, vulnerable, highly-strung Yoof of Today here, and there appears to be no way out as long as the long-held traditional system of obligation and recrimination persists.
Or the kids just stop playing, as the indigenous lads - who are just fed up with all the same stresses - appear to have done.
Just ask Ben Barba, he'll tell you.
It is a hidden problem that is rarely spoken of, taboo really; but surely, the people who are paying the wages at some point have a right to draw a line in the sand and say how much is too much of a price to pay?
Just don't know.
In any case, a not so brilliant start to the season.

NEWCASTLE KNIGHTS 42. Tries: Uate (3), Gagai (2), McManus (2). Goals: Gidley (7).
WESTS TIGERS 10. Tries: Blair, Moltzen. Goals: Marshall (1).
Crowd: 21,925.
At International Sports Centre, Newcastle.

"pale and despondent"

Brave Beserkers,

Blundered into The Front Bar at The Local on the morning of what should have been the last day of the Test Match in that well known hell-hole, Hyderabad, just to check the word on the street.
Found The Philosopher in his usual corner, perusing his tabloid copy of the Sydney Morning Herald - sans the racing form which had been cast aside in a desultory fashion - nursing this week's tipple - seems he's gone back to the Harvey Wallbanger as first drink of the day.
As he glanced at me above the rim of his glasses, he was surprisingly upbeat, actually smiled, and said "She'll be right, Crazy. Don't panic. Carry on regardless".
The obvious reply was "well, you don't mind a drink in a crisis, do you?" and thought about taking him to task, given that we are looking at a looming disaster here, over his apparent glossing over of the whole sorry business, until he said "it's only a game", and resumed his usual silent sardonic visage.
Managed to feebly mumble something like "yeah, but, 2-0 down in a four match series says to me you can't win it; it's all dead rubber from here" and with no reply, resigned myself to asking the barmaid to fix him another drink.
The Brown Bros were ambivalent about it - they've been to India too, after all - and weren't much concerned about playing Engerland at home, hoping against hope that their beloved Bluck Cups might make a good account of themselves.
A few Indians have started coming into the pub of late as the local population thickens up with them, but they strictly keep to themselves in the smoking lounge, and they are sensible enough not to gloat.
That would just be asking for trouble.
Under the circumstances, after the Madras Massacre and the Hyderabad Hideousness, there's little wonder MJ Clarke was described in the fish wraps as looking "pale and despondent" at the press conference following the second test.
You could see it on his face when he was out for 91, and declared the innings closed one run later at nine wickets down in a fit of pique.
Only to cop a gigantic tusk up the runter, Indian-style, for his trouble, through no fault of his own.
That tends to hurt, and the sub-continentals weren't subtle about it, at an innings and then some.
You can call up all the numbers you like, but seem to remember Jason Krezja was dropped for conceding more than 200 in a full match, so little wonder Lyon Nathan suffered the same fate after going for 215 in a single innings in Madras, and yet St. Xavier and Maxwell Smart, as a bowling unit, got collectively carted for 258 in a single innings in Hyderabad.
It sort of, kind of, tells you why Straya has gone through more than a dozen spinners since the Great Warney gave the game away, most of whom have consigned their Baggy Green's to glass display cases behind the bar in the rumpus room at home.
The general public were worried about the fundamentally wrong nature of the touring party from the off, and who can blame them?
Just for instance, what on earth is Mitch "Joke" Johnno doing on tour?
The bloke is all washed up, as the mentally-unstable highly-erractic individual that he is should have been years ago, and isn't within a bull's roar of playing another Test Match, and by all reports, is really crap at carrying a tray of gin and tonics.
So, why?
Never mind the batting.
FIGJAM? [who by the way, hasn't made 30 in 17 of his past 24 Test innings, and can't bowl no more].
The Hughes Kiddie?
The Suburban Boy and Mr Ed?
All over the shop like mad women's breakfasts.
And Wade reckons he's an all-rounder.
They've obviously got too many people - bookmakers, multiple coaches, discredited "sports scientists", disgraced snake oil merchants, lurkers and general hangers on - in their ear all the time telling them what they are doing wrong.
The reality is they should just stop listening, and get on with it, as they see fit.
After all, they're the ones charged with doing the job, and they see what they are dealing with over and over again with frightening immediacy from the box seat every time they go out there.
And that will be especially important, as Blake once said, in the upcoming sojourn to the strangely deceptive Green and Pleasant Land.
Pup finds himself in a bind given that he is a tour selector by tradition and defintion being the Strayan Captain, but as soon as he gets home, he should sack himself as a selector and get right away from that tawdry business.
He should declare that he has no interest in and will play no part in picking the touring party for Engerland, leaving it up to The Chairman and the Three Wise Men, who, shockingly, are no less muddled-headed than the mob of sacked faceless hopeless jokes that they replaced.
That way the leader of men can say "that's OK, I'll just skipper the 12 that you give me" in any game that's on the program.
And, he can then rightly claim, if it all goes to crap and down the gurgler, he can't be blamed.
By way of a sidebar, you'd have to be fairly certain that MJ Clarke has never taken any mind-altering or performance-enhancing drugs at any point in all his born days.
Not even in the pre-Bingle era, when he had a Ferrari, spent his money on fine clothes and expensive restaurant meals, while drinking from the top shelf and pashing every girl in town.
No, never.
Might have had a joint in his teens, but, obviously didn't inhale.
He'd flaty deny that he once enjoyed the odd brekky cone or two in his yoof, for want of hard evidence.
But let's face it, when it's all said and done, most blokes find Test Cricket is not an easy thing to do over the five days, no sireee, without a little help here and there from the drugs cabinet tucked in behind the first aid kit.
It has always been said from the very outset that it is humanly impossible to complete the Tour de France without some snakey substances on board; in the early days, the riders took absinthe in the morning to concentrate the mind, and cocaine in the afternoon to keep them going.
It was all considered completely normal, par for the course, common knowledge, nods and winks abounded, not a word needed to be spoken, and jiggidy-jig, Bob's your uncle.
Same as it ever was.