BLUES LIFT TWEED SPIRITS
ORIGIN STARS VISIT FLOOD BATTLERS
ABOUT 3.30pm yesterday Nerida Scerri was driving to her Murwillumbah workplace, the one that got smashed by the floods a few weeks back, when her phone rang.
“Hi there,” said a familiar voice. “It’s Laurie Daley.”
That’s right – the NSW State of Origin coach and a man the mother-of-two had desperately wanted to meet during the Blues’ unprecedented visit to the home of the Murwillumbah Colts Junior Rugby League Football Club.
Time got the better of Nerida though and having had photos with the Blues’ modern-day heroes, she was forced to race back to work without saying ‘hi’ to arguably their greatest ever.
“When she left she told me I had to tell Laurie she’s loved him for 30 years,” said 16year-old daughter Brianna.
Nerida’s little girl did one better.
“Brianna phoned and said Laurie Daley wants to talk to you and he was suddenly chatting to me as I was driving along,” she said.
“We just talked about how Brianna was born the day he retired and how he lived next door to one of my cousins when he was growing up in Junee.
“I then told him how much we need NSW to beat Queensland.”
That result is on every Blues fan’s wish list but for the hundreds of footy fans who flocked to Murwillumbah Colts yesterday, their idols gave them something that can’t be measured on a scoreboard.
Less than two months ago their humble home ground was a disaster zone.
Water flowed through the second level of the clubhouse. Two storage sheds that “never get flooded” were inundated, destroying priceless memorabilia and thousands of dollars’ worth of training gear.
Volunteers spent countless hours mopping up the mess, many of them between doing the same at their own homes.
The sun was shining on their club yesterday though as the boys in Blue rolled in to sign hundreds of autographs, shake countless hands and, in the case of their coach, pose for dozens of photos with middle-aged mothers.
“You don’t realise the impact you have on people sometimes,” Daley said after hanging up from his newfound friend.
“We just wanted to show our support for the guys who have been knocked around a bit with the flood … a lot of people lost their homes, their incomes. It’s terrible.
“They’re doing it tough and this is just our way of saying we’re thinking of them ... we’re only staying down the road (at Kingscliff).”