Cowboys not carried away with ‘fairytale’ hype
MICHAEL Morgan says the Cowboys are not under the impression they are about to produce a fairytale run to the premiership as they begin to shed their underdog status.
North Queensland pulled off its second finals upset on Saturday night, after it knocked the Eels out of the running for this year’s premiership – just six days after it did the same to the Sharks.
Despite finishing eighth in the regular season – and only just scraping into the finals – the Cowboys are now 80 minutes away from the grand final.
But as it turns its attention to the Roosters this Saturday, star halfback Morgan says the club and the players are not getting caught up in the hype.
While the players are proud of their progress so far, Morgan says they don’t expect anything to come easily and believes other teams will start to take them more seriously.
“We’ve got ourselves in this position from working hard and we’ll continue to do that,” he said. “It’s not going to be easy. We’re under no illusions that it’s going to be a big fairytale and it will just happen for us. As nice as that would be, we know it’s going to be tough.
“It will be hard but we’re excited for the occasion.”
The Roosters are the early favourites for Saturday’s clash, meaning the Cowboys will come in as the underdogs yet again.
But Morgan (pictured with Coen Hess) says he does not think they will be underestimated this week. He said people were starting to believe in the Cowboys in the same way they had believed in themselves over the past two weeks.
“We won’t be worried about that (added pressure),” Morgan said. “We didn’t have too many wins at the back end of the season but we’ve always said if we compete well and if we don’t roll over and go away from the challenge, eventually good things would come our way.
“The last few weeks have been off the back of that.”
Morgan’s teammate Jake Granville was also not concerned by whether the Cowboys were seen as serious contenders or not.
He said as long as the effort remained, the Cowboys could go a long way.