Will Hayne Train derail Blues
By Paul Ken
The Daily Telegraph
June 03, 2011
Attitude issues: Jarryd Hayne. Picture: Mark Evans -
Source: The Daily Telegraph
ONE day, Jarryd Hayne will understand. At the moment, Hayne has too many people cuddling him.
They quickly rushed to reassure him when he was overlooked for Origin I.
Quickly found excuses for him.
The problem with cuddles, though, is you need to break free to grow.
It has been mentioned elsewhere in this paper that NSW coach Ricky Stuart put too much emphasis on selecting players who fit the "culture" of the NSW team he wanted.
Culture is an abused term in rugby league. Some coaches and players use it without a clue, throwing it around as another buzzword because their board members will read it and nod agreeably.
But Stuart knows it's for real.
We saw it in game one.
Many people overlook the job done in that game. With nine minutes to go NSW led a Queensland team so superior, only a month earlier it had supplied 10 of the starting 13 players for Australia.
Three of the four bench players then were also Queenslanders.
They did it with the weight of possession against them 58 to 42 per cent.
In clubland, that's a 20-point difference in scoreline.
In this game, 12-10 was a miracle.
And the Blues did it all on the back of what they built in camp.
There is something to be said about culture, which in football-speak is merely the character of a group.
It's what makes a man get to his feet when his lungs are burning so much he can taste blood in his mouth.
It is getting across in defence, filling the hole in the line, backing up the break down the left edge even though somewhere inside part of them is screaming for somebody else to get across, because everything inside them tells them they're gone.
Yet they find a way because they don't want to let down their mate.
Culture in football, see, is about making it easier for the man next to you, even if it means it will be tougher for yourself.
In the coaching manuals such qualities are in every team.
In reality, few teams ever truly experience it.
They become better than the sum of their parts, like the Roosters did last year, or Parramatta the year before, or the St George Illawarra and Melbourne teams of recent years, where they delivered week after week.
That is why Queensland have always been worth marvelling at. It's just always there, year after year.
And that is what Stuart risks by choosing Hayne. Now that Brett Morris is injured, the Hayne plane/train will come on to the left wing.
His talent is such that Queensland will be just a little more nervous for his inclusion. He truly is a gifted footballer capable of hurting opposition defences.
YET how he will fit into this Blues camp will determine more the success of his selection. For Origin I the Blues were about each other, and such belief is why they got so close. Yet in past camps, Hayne's self-focus has irked teammates.
If it is repeated it threatens to undermine the Blues.
How quickly Hayne understands all this, in career terms, will determine the kind of player Hayne will be not just in this Origin series, but in the game and beyond.
As great as his talent is, the truly great ones are remembered for their premierships and their performances in representative jumpers, which really means what they brought to the team, and not for what the team did for them.
Link:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sp...ain-derail-blues/story-e6frext9-1226068146547
