BARBA HOME AT LAST
Cowboys’ legendary custodian inspires key recruit’s homecoming
COWBOYS star recruit Ben Barba says the chance to play in front of friends and family while wearing the same jersey as one of his heroes convinced him to join the club.
Barba, who has been relaxing at home in Mackay after winning the English Super League’s Man of Steel award with St Helens, made a brief visit to Cowboys headquarters yesterday. The fullback has been given a one-year contract in which he will be keen to prove he still has the Xfactor which won him a Dally M medal in 2012 and a premiership with Cronulla in 20 16.
“Growing up with some of the guys I looked up to, Matty and that, to wear the colours they wore was something I wanted to do,” Barba said. “It’s just an opportunity to come back to where I’m from.”
BACK on Australian soil, Ben Barba says being closer to his family prompted his decision to join North Queensland for his NRL return.
Barba arrived at Cowboys HQ in Townsville yesterday for a tour, before the club returns to training on November 5.
The star of the English Super League with St Helens this year, Barba battled homesickness in the second half of the season following his grandmother’s death.
The 29-year-old is staying with family in hometown Mackay as he prepares to settle in with the Cowboys in Townsville and play his first NRL game since the 2016 grand final success with Cronulla.
“It’s just an opportunity of coming back to where I’m from,” Barba told the Cowboys’ club website yesterday.
“I’ve played most my senior footy down in Sydney. And now to be just down the road from where I grew up down in Mackay, it’s going to give a lot of chance for family who haven’t seen me play live to see me a little bit more.”
All eyes will likely be on Barba and his one-year deal at the start of next season as the Cowboys enter the post-Johnathan Thurston era after finishing 13th in 2018.
Barba sat out the majority of 2017 after copping a ban for recreational drug use and left the NRL for a brief rugby union stint in France before scoring 28 tries and having 24 assists in 23 games for St Helens this year.
That helped him become just the second player to win both the Dally M Medal and the English equivalent Man of Steel award.