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1) Brisbane – In Massive Trouble
Cameron Smith returns for Melbourne Storm Friday night and this means one thing for Brisbane Broncos – complete annihilation. Perhaps not complete annihilation. This is the pundit who said the Rabbitohs were "gettable" last week before they annihilated Canberra, six tries to blot in the slop. So you may take this with so many grains of Rhodesian rock salt and always know this: Nostradamus made it all up. However … Melbourne have lost two on the trot. Each of them has caused Craig Bellamy's head to swell like a tropical sore. Bellamy and Smith have fresh memories of losing five straight across Origin last season. And men as competitively hardwired and smart as C Bellamy and C Smith will make sure their men are on the correct page Friday night at AAMI Park. Smith knows how to win. And Storm will remember here.
2) Sonny Bill
Is Sonny Bill Williams the most multi-talented player in the history of the greatest game of all, rugby league? Has there been a man who can so expertly play front-row, back-row, halfback, five-eighth and centre? How has someone possessed offloads like his? Has anyone had arms the strength and length of bionic squid tentacles? Redoubtable, interesting man Anthony Mundine says Williams will stay in rugby league because that's where his heart is. But then he's also said he is the greatest boxer in the history of Australia and that Blake Ferguson will never drink another beer. Nice fellow, Choc. Talks more crap than Don King. Williams was very sad to leave New Zealand rugby and wouldn't have had he not shaken hands with Nick Politis, a man who gets things he wants. How much will he want Williams? A lot. For now, the Dragons at Kogarah Jubilee.
3) Once More, Warriors?
Souths. The final frontier. No-one's written that since 1971, if ever. But this year the Bunnies are a bigger and more real deal than a much larger Daniel "Real Deal" Geale. Something like it. A hard-boned combination of thumping Pommy forwards, super-scheming NSW "A" halves and a super-freak at fullback, they are hot right now like lava. And if the Warriors can knock them over in Perth on Sunday it would be their sixth straight victory since being torched 62-6 by Penrith, and excite the people of the Shaky Isles like Benji Williams playing for the (Auckland) Blues. They got within two points in Auckland. Could be a good one.
4) Hayne plane
Any sort of game from Jarryd "Plane and/or Train" Hayne and Laurie Daley brings him straight into the big Blue fold. If Hayne just survives, he's in. But what if he kills Manly, and hops about at fullback like a pronking springbok, and wins the game for his team from the custodial position, is he the Blues' fullback? Josh Dugan is having a week off, but Laurie Daley knows what he can do, which wasn't a whole lot in Big Dance II. Does Daley persist with Nathan Merritt who rushed up on Greg Inglis in Origin which allowed Johnathan Thurston to hit Darius Boyd wide? Probably he does not. So Hayne for wing? He can play there, for he's always been an enigmatic one, and capable of much derring-do. But will he get the chance? Manly at Brookvale after losing three straight, these are ants angrier than the notorious bullet ant (Paraponera clavata) of Central and South America, so-called for its excruciating sting. Mind you they'll already have named the team, so it's moot how he plays anyway. Ha.
5) ... And fondly remembering advertising gold
In the early 80s, a company called Tooheys – a maker of a popular hops-based beverage – made a series of advertisements which were so popular that more cans – "tinnies" – of the product rained down upon Englishmen on the SCG Hill than any other brand. One rugby league version starred Noel "Crusher" Cleal, Phil Blake, Peter Sterling, Brett Kenny and Ray "Mr Perpetual Motion" Price in a game of footy at Brookvale Oval, on a day 27,000 people crammed into the venerable old suburban ground. And at your earliest convenience you should check out the clip on YouTube, and sing along, perhaps while swaying from side-to-side with a beer as people do in Bavarian bierhauses. Sing it: "So here we go again, Manly and Parra / Parra's well ahead but the gap starts to narra' / Manly's comin' back, seems like they're built outta steeeel / How do ya feeeel? Ya pump 'em, bust 'em, pick 'em up and dump 'em / Manly's comin' back, Crusher keeps on comin' / It just goes to show what an Eagle can do to an Eeeeel / How do ya feeeel? Manly's comin' back, a good try'll do it / Up goes the bomb – too bad, they blew it! / The Eels see a chance and latch on to it / Mr Motion comes slidin' in / And all the crowd begin to sing …. Iiiiiii feel like a Tooheys! / I feel like a Tooheys! / I feel like a Tooheys, or two!" Nearly 30 years later they play at Brookvale Monday night.
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