All Hail Mitch
Kennel Enthusiast
- Joined
- Mar 23, 2014
- Messages
- 1,940
- Reaction score
- 1,218
Great article in the SMH today, the sort of statements I love hearing our players make.
http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/...m-thinking-about-winning-20150910-gjjmr8.html
Canterbury Bulldogs skipper James Graham: 'I'm not thinking about the 60-year-old me. I'm thinking about winning."
By*ANDREW WEBSTER
If you're going to interview James Graham, it may as well be in a bar.
Relax, Des.*We are drinking tea. And it's not just any bar, but the long bar in the members' pavilion at the Sydney Cricket Ground.
The old cedar-wood bar remains untouched. If only these cream walls could talk, because surely*there would be gold among*the decades of drunken gibber.
Out beyond the glass doors and white pickets is the emerald turf. This is where the legend of Canterbury-Bankstown was born.
This is where The Entertainers became The Enforcers. Dogs of War, playing Wozzaball. Big, strong, unyielding forwards who did whatever it took to win, no matter the consequences at the judiciary at Phillip Street on Monday night.
They were streetfighters. Peter Kelly. Peter Tunks. David Gillespie. Geoff Robinson. A full deck of Scanlens trading cards, ready to fight the good fight. Any fight.
James Graham was born in the wrong era. He should've played in the 1980s. He should've been one of them. Should've been alongside them.
Because out there, in the middle of the SCG on grand final day, he would only have to deal with what was real, instead of all the annoying little side issues like perception and image and sending the right message to the kiddies that prevent footballers from doing what they're only really supposed to do.*Win.
"I am going to sound like such a dick for saying this," starts Graham, shaking his head. "We now have this society that is this scripted reality. We're*behaving the way we're told to behave. But you've got this real life, and people criticise others for acting the way they really feel. I look back and think I would like to change things. I would change the way I acted on Good Friday [against South Sydney]. I would. The reality is that's how I felt back then. That's how I was getting the frustration out. It wasn't a good look. But that was real. That was really happening.
"The reason they mike up the referee is because people really want to know what's happening. If people are so concerned what little Johnny or little Susie are going to do on the weekend, don't mike them up. Don't keep showing it over and over again.
"I hate this scripted reality society that we're*becoming. This is real. If you don't want it, take the mikes off the ref. It's sport. When I watch sport, and I see someone's not caring, when I see them thinking, 'Oh well, I'll go home and check the bank balance, I got paid today', it annoys me."
Amen to that, brother. Players who care. What a novel idea in this age when teams are flogged by 40 points but within seconds of full-time their players are hugging the opposition and smiling like it's New Year's Eve.
The moment I wanted to interview the Bulldogs captain came three weeks ago when, in the first minute of the second half against Souths, his head collected prop Tim Grant's hip in a tackle, and he staggered about like the drunkest man at the party.
Suspecting concussion, the Bulldogs trainer started to drag him from the field. Graham was incensed. "I'm fine!" he barked*in his thick Scouse accent. He later returned and clocked more run metres than any other player.
So about that concussion …
"I didn't get concussed," Graham*interrupts sternly, raising a finger.
Righto. So tell us*about being an old-school footballer, keepin' it real.*You like that description?
"I don't take it as an insult," he says. "I guess I probably would take it as a compliment. I don't know … Rugby league is my life. The plan was for me not to exit the field a minute into the second half. I felt like I was fine. Obviously, they've seen the warning signs. I understand the recent focus on concussions. I understand why I had to come off. It doesn't mean I have to be happy about it.
"In rugby league, there are plenty of times when I get little knocks and I need to come off. For me, I felt like I was fine to play on. It's a hard game. There are times when there's going to be head knocks, and there's going to be contact with the head. I am all for player safety. But people have to remember that I'm not thinking about the 50 or 60-year-old me. I'm thinking about winning this game for the Bulldogs."
It was the physicality of rugby league that prevented Graham*from becoming a soccer player.
His father, John, is a rugby league fan from Cumbria, a stronghold for the game in England, and he would make the pilgrimage to Wembley each year with Graham's grandfather to watch the Challenge Cup final.
One year, they got off the bus en route to "get supplies" at a nearby newsagency. "To get booze," laughs Graham. His father spied*a tiny advert calling for players for the St Helens Crusaders under-8s.
From the moment Graham took the field, he was hooked. "It was all action," he recalls. "Soccer is more of a game of skill. Rugby league is all action. I don't watch a lot of rugby league now, but that's why I play it."
Which takes us to a garage door somewhere in the north of England after his team, Blackbrook under-16s, had won a national cup. His coach Greg Peters has told the story before of Graham trying to tackle a brick wall.
"He's thrown me under the bus," grins Graham. "I honestly don't remember that … I tell you what it was. We'd just won the national cup. We probably weren't supposed to be drinking. We were celebrating and had two beers and thought we were super*heroes. I don't think I was the only one running at a garage pull-down door. We were all taking turns."
But still …
What about the story about rubbing cooking oil on your legs, in much the same way you covered your legs in Vaseline during your first handful of games in the NRL in 2012?
"Now that is true! Again, I wasn't the only one who did that. One of our old coaches rubbed cooking oil on our legs. Maybe it was a fetish of his. But it was to slide [defenders]*off. The Vaseline came from that. I can imagine the look on some of the faces of the Bulldogs if I started rubbing cooking oil on my legs."
Through 220 matches over eight seasons for St Helens, Graham developed into the ball-playing front-rower that eventually made the rest of the world take notice. The cornerstone of that was his hunger to win.
He deflects claims from former Saints coach Daniel Anderson that rival forwards in the Super League targeted him with cheap shots, trying to spark a detonation because he wanted it*too*much. "I don't think it was exclusive to me," Graham says. "That was the style a lot of sides played against Saints to throw us off our natural game."
By his own admission, though, his emotions were starting to get the better of him in the NRL. Only now is he mastering himself.
At a Bulldogs pre-season camp at Kingscliff during summer, the club's mind coach, John Novak, gave a presentation. "Sometimes you just can't let it all out," he told Graham. "You have to hold it in."
On the field, Graham holds nothing back.*In the final seconds of the now-infamous Good Friday clash at ANZ Stadium, he dived and collected the legs of Rabbitohs halfback Adam Reynolds as he attempted a miracle field goal with the scores locked.
Referee Gerard Sutton awarded a penalty … and then all hell broke loose. The ugly*episode cost Graham*three matches from two charges.
What did he learn from that?
"I learnt that I can't behave that way when things don't go my way," Graham says. "At the time, I stood by my actions and the way I behaved. I see now that I can't do that. It's wrong. I'm not going to change the referee's mind, and I don't want to get suspended again."
Tell him that the tackle was fractionally illegal. That he was going for the charge down. That the game has gone soft …
"I know! I know! But they're the rules. He got it right. I feel embarrassed not knowing that rule [to award a penalty in front of the posts]. There was no intention whatsoever to injure Adam Reynolds. He was 40m out. Maybe even 45. He's a good kicker of the ball, but on a wet night, a little bit of pressure … If I don't dive, he probably still doesn't kick it. But I did. I'm sorry if I caused an injury but it was never my intention. But looking back, it's not acceptable, as the captain of the club."
Since then, Graham has attempted to tone down his animation when talking to*the referees by following the lead of English Premier League players who put their hands behind their backs when approaching officials.
He also reveals that NRL head of football Todd Greenberg – the man who signed Graham when he was Bulldogs chief executive – came into the England camp last year during the Four Nations to show them how tough the referee's job can be.
"We watched a video on ref cam and we had to make a call through the eyes of the referee," he*recalls. "You just don't know. I don't know if it's a strip, or if it's a knock on. I don't want to make that decision.
"Referees have a huge part to play in the game … It's so funny sitting here now, I can say that. I wouldn't want to make their decisions. But when you are actually out there, especially being captain when I'm the voice of the whole organisation, I am the only one who can speak about the injustice that's been done … It's very difficult to have that empathy for the referee when there is so much on the line. People will say you've set a bad example for the kids. Well, I'm not thinking of little Johnny when I'm out there. I'm thinking of getting two points for the Bulldogs."
Sounds like something the Dogs of War would say. So we phoned a couple.
"I like him," says Gillespie, who from 1984-90 made several thunderous tackles for the Bulldogs, some of them legal, some not. "He can be a bit over the top. But take that away and he plays it hard, leads by example. There's no bullshit about him. Our forward pack back then was the same."
And this from Tunks, who played 125 games from 1984-89 and was captain when the Dogs beat Balmain in '88: "He's the type of leader who says, 'Follow me'. He would appreciate being in our pack. He's got some nastiness. Some mongrel. A throwback to that era."
That ethos is in the woodwork at Belmore, magically handed down from generation to generation. Under Des*Hasler (a former Manly coach and player) and Graham (a firebrand from Liverpool), the legend of Canterbury-Bankstown still flickers.
"I'm aware of the club's history," says Graham. "You do hear some comparisons [to the forwards from the 80s]. I haven't spent too much time speaking to them. I play my own game and be the best me."
Then he adds*this, and it's enough to bring a tear to an old*front-rower's eye.
"People are passionate about it. Being a Bulldogs fan is their whole life. This isn't a*pastime. This is everything. You can see how much this means to people. They surely want to see their players care."
http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/...m-thinking-about-winning-20150910-gjjmr8.html
Canterbury Bulldogs skipper James Graham: 'I'm not thinking about the 60-year-old me. I'm thinking about winning."
By*ANDREW WEBSTER
If you're going to interview James Graham, it may as well be in a bar.
Relax, Des.*We are drinking tea. And it's not just any bar, but the long bar in the members' pavilion at the Sydney Cricket Ground.
The old cedar-wood bar remains untouched. If only these cream walls could talk, because surely*there would be gold among*the decades of drunken gibber.
Out beyond the glass doors and white pickets is the emerald turf. This is where the legend of Canterbury-Bankstown was born.
This is where The Entertainers became The Enforcers. Dogs of War, playing Wozzaball. Big, strong, unyielding forwards who did whatever it took to win, no matter the consequences at the judiciary at Phillip Street on Monday night.
They were streetfighters. Peter Kelly. Peter Tunks. David Gillespie. Geoff Robinson. A full deck of Scanlens trading cards, ready to fight the good fight. Any fight.
James Graham was born in the wrong era. He should've played in the 1980s. He should've been one of them. Should've been alongside them.
Because out there, in the middle of the SCG on grand final day, he would only have to deal with what was real, instead of all the annoying little side issues like perception and image and sending the right message to the kiddies that prevent footballers from doing what they're only really supposed to do.*Win.
"I am going to sound like such a dick for saying this," starts Graham, shaking his head. "We now have this society that is this scripted reality. We're*behaving the way we're told to behave. But you've got this real life, and people criticise others for acting the way they really feel. I look back and think I would like to change things. I would change the way I acted on Good Friday [against South Sydney]. I would. The reality is that's how I felt back then. That's how I was getting the frustration out. It wasn't a good look. But that was real. That was really happening.
"The reason they mike up the referee is because people really want to know what's happening. If people are so concerned what little Johnny or little Susie are going to do on the weekend, don't mike them up. Don't keep showing it over and over again.
"I hate this scripted reality society that we're*becoming. This is real. If you don't want it, take the mikes off the ref. It's sport. When I watch sport, and I see someone's not caring, when I see them thinking, 'Oh well, I'll go home and check the bank balance, I got paid today', it annoys me."
Amen to that, brother. Players who care. What a novel idea in this age when teams are flogged by 40 points but within seconds of full-time their players are hugging the opposition and smiling like it's New Year's Eve.
The moment I wanted to interview the Bulldogs captain came three weeks ago when, in the first minute of the second half against Souths, his head collected prop Tim Grant's hip in a tackle, and he staggered about like the drunkest man at the party.
Suspecting concussion, the Bulldogs trainer started to drag him from the field. Graham was incensed. "I'm fine!" he barked*in his thick Scouse accent. He later returned and clocked more run metres than any other player.
So about that concussion …
"I didn't get concussed," Graham*interrupts sternly, raising a finger.
Righto. So tell us*about being an old-school footballer, keepin' it real.*You like that description?
"I don't take it as an insult," he says. "I guess I probably would take it as a compliment. I don't know … Rugby league is my life. The plan was for me not to exit the field a minute into the second half. I felt like I was fine. Obviously, they've seen the warning signs. I understand the recent focus on concussions. I understand why I had to come off. It doesn't mean I have to be happy about it.
"In rugby league, there are plenty of times when I get little knocks and I need to come off. For me, I felt like I was fine to play on. It's a hard game. There are times when there's going to be head knocks, and there's going to be contact with the head. I am all for player safety. But people have to remember that I'm not thinking about the 50 or 60-year-old me. I'm thinking about winning this game for the Bulldogs."
It was the physicality of rugby league that prevented Graham*from becoming a soccer player.
His father, John, is a rugby league fan from Cumbria, a stronghold for the game in England, and he would make the pilgrimage to Wembley each year with Graham's grandfather to watch the Challenge Cup final.
One year, they got off the bus en route to "get supplies" at a nearby newsagency. "To get booze," laughs Graham. His father spied*a tiny advert calling for players for the St Helens Crusaders under-8s.
From the moment Graham took the field, he was hooked. "It was all action," he recalls. "Soccer is more of a game of skill. Rugby league is all action. I don't watch a lot of rugby league now, but that's why I play it."
Which takes us to a garage door somewhere in the north of England after his team, Blackbrook under-16s, had won a national cup. His coach Greg Peters has told the story before of Graham trying to tackle a brick wall.
"He's thrown me under the bus," grins Graham. "I honestly don't remember that … I tell you what it was. We'd just won the national cup. We probably weren't supposed to be drinking. We were celebrating and had two beers and thought we were super*heroes. I don't think I was the only one running at a garage pull-down door. We were all taking turns."
But still …
What about the story about rubbing cooking oil on your legs, in much the same way you covered your legs in Vaseline during your first handful of games in the NRL in 2012?
"Now that is true! Again, I wasn't the only one who did that. One of our old coaches rubbed cooking oil on our legs. Maybe it was a fetish of his. But it was to slide [defenders]*off. The Vaseline came from that. I can imagine the look on some of the faces of the Bulldogs if I started rubbing cooking oil on my legs."
Through 220 matches over eight seasons for St Helens, Graham developed into the ball-playing front-rower that eventually made the rest of the world take notice. The cornerstone of that was his hunger to win.
He deflects claims from former Saints coach Daniel Anderson that rival forwards in the Super League targeted him with cheap shots, trying to spark a detonation because he wanted it*too*much. "I don't think it was exclusive to me," Graham says. "That was the style a lot of sides played against Saints to throw us off our natural game."
By his own admission, though, his emotions were starting to get the better of him in the NRL. Only now is he mastering himself.
At a Bulldogs pre-season camp at Kingscliff during summer, the club's mind coach, John Novak, gave a presentation. "Sometimes you just can't let it all out," he told Graham. "You have to hold it in."
On the field, Graham holds nothing back.*In the final seconds of the now-infamous Good Friday clash at ANZ Stadium, he dived and collected the legs of Rabbitohs halfback Adam Reynolds as he attempted a miracle field goal with the scores locked.
Referee Gerard Sutton awarded a penalty … and then all hell broke loose. The ugly*episode cost Graham*three matches from two charges.
What did he learn from that?
"I learnt that I can't behave that way when things don't go my way," Graham says. "At the time, I stood by my actions and the way I behaved. I see now that I can't do that. It's wrong. I'm not going to change the referee's mind, and I don't want to get suspended again."
Tell him that the tackle was fractionally illegal. That he was going for the charge down. That the game has gone soft …
"I know! I know! But they're the rules. He got it right. I feel embarrassed not knowing that rule [to award a penalty in front of the posts]. There was no intention whatsoever to injure Adam Reynolds. He was 40m out. Maybe even 45. He's a good kicker of the ball, but on a wet night, a little bit of pressure … If I don't dive, he probably still doesn't kick it. But I did. I'm sorry if I caused an injury but it was never my intention. But looking back, it's not acceptable, as the captain of the club."
Since then, Graham has attempted to tone down his animation when talking to*the referees by following the lead of English Premier League players who put their hands behind their backs when approaching officials.
He also reveals that NRL head of football Todd Greenberg – the man who signed Graham when he was Bulldogs chief executive – came into the England camp last year during the Four Nations to show them how tough the referee's job can be.
"We watched a video on ref cam and we had to make a call through the eyes of the referee," he*recalls. "You just don't know. I don't know if it's a strip, or if it's a knock on. I don't want to make that decision.
"Referees have a huge part to play in the game … It's so funny sitting here now, I can say that. I wouldn't want to make their decisions. But when you are actually out there, especially being captain when I'm the voice of the whole organisation, I am the only one who can speak about the injustice that's been done … It's very difficult to have that empathy for the referee when there is so much on the line. People will say you've set a bad example for the kids. Well, I'm not thinking of little Johnny when I'm out there. I'm thinking of getting two points for the Bulldogs."
Sounds like something the Dogs of War would say. So we phoned a couple.
"I like him," says Gillespie, who from 1984-90 made several thunderous tackles for the Bulldogs, some of them legal, some not. "He can be a bit over the top. But take that away and he plays it hard, leads by example. There's no bullshit about him. Our forward pack back then was the same."
And this from Tunks, who played 125 games from 1984-89 and was captain when the Dogs beat Balmain in '88: "He's the type of leader who says, 'Follow me'. He would appreciate being in our pack. He's got some nastiness. Some mongrel. A throwback to that era."
That ethos is in the woodwork at Belmore, magically handed down from generation to generation. Under Des*Hasler (a former Manly coach and player) and Graham (a firebrand from Liverpool), the legend of Canterbury-Bankstown still flickers.
"I'm aware of the club's history," says Graham. "You do hear some comparisons [to the forwards from the 80s]. I haven't spent too much time speaking to them. I play my own game and be the best me."
Then he adds*this, and it's enough to bring a tear to an old*front-rower's eye.
"People are passionate about it. Being a Bulldogs fan is their whole life. This isn't a*pastime. This is everything. You can see how much this means to people. They surely want to see their players care."
