Cronk a tough Rooster
Italy star on drugs charges
That Cooper Cronk, he’s one tough little Rooster, playing with a broken left shoulder blade in the grand final, and all. Coaching guru Phil Gould called it ‘‘one of the best non-performances I’ve ever seen’’, as Cronk became the first player to win back-to-back finals with different sides since halfback Johnny Mayes in 1973-74, with Manly and Easts.
Cronk played all but the last two minutes . . . well, he directed traffic for all but the last two minutes, 78 minutes of waving, pointing and shouting.
In that time he managed one kick every 19 minutes, touched the ball every four minutes 20 seconds, and made a tackle on average a tick under every nine minutes.
Nice work if you can get it. Apart from the searing pain, of course.
As much as Cronk Courage, what we have here is a Trent Robinson coaching masterpiece, with Luke Keary putting in a double time shift in the halves to cover for his unwell workmate.
Robinson came into the grand final amid a week of seemingly uncertainty over whether his star player would play. He had a Cunning Plan A (plays) and a Cunning Plan B (watches on).
Plan B was so cunning, you’d have to be a Russian spy to decode it. There’s a few clever Roosters in his side; just you try to understand what Robinson is trying to say here.
‘‘We had two different plans,’’ Robinson said. ‘‘We were ready for if it didn’t work out, we were ready to jump into that as well. Everybody was ready.
‘‘Plan B was the double bluff. Mitchell Aubusson was going to defend three-in on the right, Isaac Liu was going to play right edge back row but Mitchell Aubusson was going to play like Cooper did on short sides and Luke [Keary] was going to run the game with Teddy and our centres were going to move as an extra pivot from left to right, so our centres were going to take a fair bit of load and run extra plays. Latrell was going to kick on the left.’’
Got that everyone? You’ve all read the white board? Right get out there and do it for the club.
Robinson also had to sell the idea that a player on a contract worth about A$1 million (NZ$1.09m) would pop into work for the afternoon, as a blue, red and white decoy for the Storm tacklers.
Cronk’s left arm flopped to one side, as he ran the show with set-upon-set of busy lips.
Under instruction, Keary swept here and there. Now a five-eighth. Now a halfback. He was first receiver, second receiver, here a short kick, there a long one.
How would you feel if your boss said ‘here’s Bazza, he’s earning twice what you get, but for the good of the company, today you will do his job as well as your’s. Bazza will yell at you, and point out what you should be doing. You good with that?’
Sell it Robinson did. Keary turned in a man-of-the-match performance at both seven or six shovelling the tarmac, rolling it flat, and applying the painted lines for a Roosters victory, as in No 23 Cronk held the stop-go sign.
Keary made 18 kicks for 451 metres to Cronk’s four for 69 and made 16 tackles to nine. He touched the ball 71 times to Cronk’s 18.
Cronk mentioned his hard-working buddy post match.
‘‘We room every week and we talk a lot about football and the mentalities . . . someone asked him during the week and he said, ‘I don’t care if Cooper is playing or not’,’’ Cronk said.
‘‘I thought, ‘That’s a bit aggressive’ but he showed where his mindset was at. He owned it and he played the game of his life tonight. It was all set up for him.’’
‘‘I was basically going to be run a decoy on the opposite side of the field. He took it, he ran with it, he was tough, he had a high skills set, he just wanted it. He didn’t hesitate. He saw something and went for it.’’
Without being privy to talk at the Roosters about whether Cronk should play or not, and without knowing what the result would have been had they used 13 fit players from the start, this was a decision that was fraught.
At 88kg and 1.78m Cronk was a lame bantam, should the Melbourne Storm target him. Five of the Storm starting pack weighed over 100kg, and interchange players Nelson AsofaSolomona and Sam Kasiano are 115kg and 126kg respectively.
You’d think a player with two good shoulders would be a bonus against a pack that size, and yet the Roosters risked it, covered for it, and the Storm mostly failed to find him.
Cronk never missed a tackle, the stats say. His front-on 53rd minute tackle on Asofa-Solomona hurt; Cronk said he shut his eyes and hoped for the best.
And the best happened. The gamble paid off. A gamble it was, nevertheless.
While we may never know how much risk was involved, the rewards are there to see – a tough Rooster with a lot to crow about. Italy test prop Sami Panico has been arrested for alleged drug trafficking, according to Italian media reports. The 25-year-old, who has played 10 tests, allegedly had 1.5kg of marijuana and 330g of hashish seized from his home at Torvajanica, south of Rome, as well as a large sum of money, news agency Ansa reported. Panico was arrested on a drugdealing charge and is now under house arrest while he awaits trial.