Are you sure that's what he said?
Yes in a round about sort of way....
http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/...lues-escape-sticky-wicket-20110617-1g7qy.html
Single win and Blues escape Sticky wicket
Richard Hinds
June 18, 2011
Illustration: Edd Aragon.
What did the NSW squad do after putting on a performance that had the fans dancing in the aisles, the statisticians drooling and the most one-eyed Queenslander wondering for the first time since Sir Joh was feeding the chooks whether the Maroons might be vincible?
Ricky Stuart put on his Hawaiian shirt and was last seen having a relaxing massage in the Balinese hinterland. Anthony Watmough resumed rehearsals for his forthcoming role as Mary Poppins. Akuila Uate went back to his day job mucking out Nathan Tinkler's stables.
After all, Stuart said he would be happy to win one game. So Wednesday night was mission accomplished. Time to let the hair down, beer o'clock and last one with his trousers on is a mummy's boy. No reason to rain on Darren Lockyer's farewell parade by turning up for Origin III in a fit condition to play.
And, if you believe that, you will believe Michael Ennis is a Trappist monk, Jamie Soward's teammates call him ''Smiley'' and Paul Gallen sleeps with the light on.
Mal Meninga gave a knowing grin when his old teammate Stuart tried, in a manner more transparent than Lara Bingle's party frock, to deflate expectations of the Blues. Stuart is to stand-up comedy what Kylie Minogue is to piano removal. But the ''happy to win one game'' line got big laughs north of the Tweed.
And at home? It is now strange to recall the reaction to Stuart's cheeky remark two months ago. Bloody Ricky Stuart covering his back. A small man lowering the bar so he could sneak under. After five humiliating years, the new coach was already grooming fans for defeat. Or so the doomsayers muttered.
It didn't help that, when he took the job, Stuart's popularity rating made Julia Gillard seem like Pippa Middleton. No doubt the reflexive negativity towards the new regime was a consequence of those five abject years. But almost every decision Stuart made in the lead-up to Origin I - particularly the exclusion of Jarryd Hayne - only hardened the opinion of the critics: ''We're rooned!''
Now? Since delivering that single victory, the tide of public opinion has turned faster than Casey Stoner on a hairpin bend. Stuart could now pick Matt Preston at prop and hand the kicking duties to Gai Waterhouse, and Blues fans would be salivating at the prospect of the Flying Cravat putting Petero Civoniceva on his backside and Golden Boot Gai knocking one over the bar in a pair of Jimmy Choos.
Suddenly, Stuart is a footballing alchemist. A selector of wisdom and foresight - the anti-Hilditch. A master tactician, who, by making cumbersome prop forwards as fashionable as leather pants, bamboozled the usually astute Maroons. The chorus of praise is well deserved.
As usual, Phil Gould provided the most succinct summary of what his former protege and occasional sparring partner had given the Blues. ''It's called self-belief,'' said Gould, struggling to conceal his excitement in the afterglow of Wednesday night's pulsating victory.
That self-belief began with the assured, defiant manner in which the bantamesque Stuart carried himself despite the early scepticism. It flowed when he put his faith in players others had overlooked and even ridiculed.
But it needed a moment of validation. In years to come, Wednesday night's clinching try might be remembered as the instant when the Origin zeitgeist changed.
Set up by Soward, the so-called speed hump who was ''not an Origin player''. Scored by Anthony Minichiello, who, if you believed the gloomiest forecasts, had been dragged from the bingo room at a retirement village to play fullback, not wisely chosen because he possessed the experience and calm assurance that was evident every time he touched the ball.
NSW's revival could not have come at a better time for Origin, and for the game itself. David Gallop might have been a touch miffed Stuart stirred up a club versus state controversy in his post-match press conference. But coming on the same day the AFL released its customary hooray-for-us mid-year statistics, Origin II - watched by an average national audience of 3.41 million - provided an impressive flexing of rugby league muscle.
Origin III will be the biggest football event this year. Bigger than the Wallabies making the World Cup final. Bigger than traditional rivals Collingwood-Carlton playing in an AFL grand final.
Funny thing is, for all that, Stuart has achieved only his minimum goal. The one victory he mischievously predicted would be enough. But if the Blues have only won a single battle, Origin is again a war.
