http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/nrl/if-only-kelly-could-play-like-carney/story-e6frfgbo-1226299642654
NO ONE at Cronulla can understand the behaviour of Albert Kelly.
Gone off the rails, they say. Refuses to listen.
Almost as if this young, Aboriginal upstart believes footballers can still act - gasp - the complete tool so long as their ability to throw spirals, bust tackles or step from both feet remains intact.
"Albert's a really talented kid but unfortunately his actions indicated he didn't want to be here,'' Sharks chairman Damian Irvine said in these pages yesterday.
"I've taken him for coffee and to lunch just to talk and try to help him but sadly it hasn't worked out."
And no one at Cronulla can believe it. Really?
No one able to understand how a young, country boy from Bowraville, a kid who only turned 21 in March, would fail to grasp what's expected at a club who signed no less than Todd Carney to effectively take his place?
Now Carney, you may recall, is the footballer cut by Canberra and booted from Bondi. Even hunted from his own home town of Goulburn for a time.
And yet still he's in the NRL.
So too Robert Lui, the wayward West Tiger who now plays for North Queensland with an assault charge hanging over him. The same Robert Lui cleared of assaulting the same victim, the mother of his child, in April last year.
And still there are no light bulbs coming on in the Shire? Or NRL HQ?
For certainly no one condones the behaviour of a footballer given "umpteen chances". Nor question Cronulla's efforts to straighten him out.
And while, ultimately, every man is responsible for his own actions, let's not pretend clubs, the league, even sycophantic managers aren't a major part of the problem.
Making Albert Kelly the fella any club would cut . . . until they're short a playmaker.
