My thoughts on the selection for representative teams I
t’s that time of the year again when First Nations rugby league fans get to see if our players will be selected on merit for one of several representative teams announced at the end of last weekend’s round of games. For me personally I was delighted with the selection of five of our mob in the starting line-up for the peak representative side, The Holden Kangaroos in the VB Test to be played against the New Zealand team at Canberra Stadium on Friday April 19. Centres Greg Inglis (South Sydney Rabbitohs) and Justin Hodges (Brisbane Broncos), Five-Eighth Johnathan Thurston (North Queensland Cowboys), Second Rowers Greg Bird (Gold Coast Titans) and Sam Thaiday (Bisbane Broncos) will take their place in the 13 man squad to go into battle when the whistle is blown to commence the game. Not a bad percentage when considering the five players out of 13 come from a small 2.6% of Australia’s population base and 10% of those who play in the top grade in the National Rugby League. I was expecting to see Inglis, Hodges, Thurston and Bird in the run-on squad but was delighted to also see Broncos’ inspirational captain Sam Thaiday’s name read out in the Kangaroos. All our superstar players, including the NRL first $1m+ a year players Inglis and Thurston, have been
in scintallating form in the first six rounds of the competition and deserve their representative honours. Thaiday was missing from the Broncos strong win over the Gold Coast Titans a week ago after serving a one week suspension for touching a referee during the game against the Melbourne Storm at Brisbane’s Suncorp Stadium and needed to step up to the mark in Friday night’s blockbuster against the North Queensland Cowboys. With a captain’s knock of 38 tackles and 117m from 16 hit-ups to lead his team to a memorable win over their Queensland rivals from the north, it was a safe bet to ink in Thaiday’s name for further national representative honours. With the birth of his first child on Wednesday, Thaiday capped off a week to remember and credit to him. The one disappointment for me, and going on Facebook comments, thousands of other First Nations avid rugby league fans were disappointed about the omission of the NRL leading try scorer Nathan Merritt (South Sydney Rabbitoh’s winger). I don’t know what else this try scoring machine has to do to please the national selectors. I remember his name being mentioned by pundits back in 2011 when Merritt scored eight tries in six days (five tries in a Monday night game and then a hat trick in the nation’s capital six days later).
Merritt is no late bloomer in the try scoring department. He was the leading tryscorer in the NRL back in 2006 and what made that year and his outstanding achievements even more remarkable was the fact that his team (South Sydney Rabbitoh’s) finished the season with the wooden spoon. Merritt did however get a consolation representative NRL jumper by being named in the GIO City Origin team alongside First Nations Interchange player Andrew Fifita (Cronulla Sharks). Winger Merritt and Front Rower Fifita will play against First Nations representatives from the Country Origin team that include Fullback Michael Gordon (Cronulla Sharks), Centres Jamal Idris (Gold Coast Titans) and Jack Wighton (Canberra Raiders) and Interchange Front Rower Ryan James (Gold Coast Titans). City v Country Origin game will be played at the BCU International Stadium, Coffs Harbour on the same night as the Test match played in Canberra against New Zealand. I wish all our representative players the very best for the respective games this coming weekend and trust common sense will prevail and Nathan Merritt will gain his rightful place on the left wing for the skyblue of New South Wales when the State of Origin teams are named in the coming weeks.