Fifteen-thousand kilometres may separate North Queensland Cowboys home base of 1300 Smiles Stadium on Sunday (early Monday Australian time) from England’s north, but the memory of a great man will bring them closer and more united to their Leeds Rhinos counterparts.
Graham Murray coached both of these teams during his 390 matches in both Super League and the National Rugby League. At Leeds he took the club to a Super League Grand Final loss to Wigan in 1998 before winning the prestigious Challenge Cup against the London Broncos a year later.
In April 2002 he replaced former Cowboys coach Murray Hurst. Murray would coach for seven seasons at the club with the highlight reaching the 2005 Grand Final where Benji Marshall’s Wests Tigers took the crown.
He won respect from both sides of the world for his professionalism and mentoring.
Murray suffered from ill-health before passing away on July 28, 2013.
Sunday’s game will honour the player of the match with the Graham Murray Medal in a sign of unity between these two sides.
Murray would have known the difference in climate and culture between the two cities.
The Cowboys have been training in sweltering high-thirty degree temperatures over the summer as they look to defend their first premiership title. Townsville is a major bush centre which is home to around 170,000 locals. With over 10,000 members already signed on for the new premiership season which starts on March 3, there’s high expectations they can go back to back with a relatively similar playing roster.
In contrast, Leeds Rhinos have endured a wet summer with flooding in the region over Christmas which is not ideal preparation for the new Super League season. The forecast for Sunday’s game at Headingley is expected to reach a maximum of eleven degrees. The hub of Yorkshire is home to around 1.7million and competes with the famous football club Leeds United for the back pages of the local paper.
Unusually, North Queensland coach Paul Green has been fortunate to name the same seventeen that took out the premiership. That coming 107 days after their one point thriller against Brisbane Broncos. They will be weary of jumping out of the blocks too quickly in 2016 to avoid a repeat of South Sydney’s season which unraveled towards the end of their premiership defence.
It’s been a rocky start for the Rhinos after dominating in every competition last year as they took out the much sought after treble. They’ve started the new season with two losses and a host of stars out with injury. Five try Challenge Cup final hero Tom Briscoe is one of them having scored 115 tries in 177 appearances for Leeds and Hull FC.
For Leeds to be any chance of making this game a contest it will fall squarely on the shoulders of Zak Hardaker. An outstanding year for the Rhinos elevated the fullback to the final three in line to win the Golden Boot Award. One aspect Hardaker will be looking to improve will be in goal kicking department after taking over from the recently departed Sir Kevin Sinfield.
There’s no doubt if Hardaker can fire that centre pairing of Kallum Watkins and Joel Moon will follow suit. Moon has spent time in the National Rugby League notably with the Broncos and New Zealand Warriors and is underrated compared to Watkins who has twelve caps with England under his belt.
Ryan Hall with 190 tries in 239 games will make life difficult for Kyle Feldt who only has 22 games to his name.
Adam Curthbertson will lead the pack. Rugby league fans either side of the world will know how good his offloading skills are, setting a record in Super League last season with 125 disposals. This second phase play will be crucial for Leeds to gain momentum.
Keith Galloway and former Bronco Mitch Garbutt are finding their feet at the club, so too Brett Ferres after his controversial departure from Huddersfield at the end of 2015.
With media attention focused on how the Cowboys will adapt to the wet, cold climate in the north of England, may it not be forgotten how well skilled the side is with Johnathan Thurston leading from the front.
Michael Morgan had a breakthrough 2015 after showing signs over the last couple of years of being a superstar in the NRL. His partnership with Thurston will put shivers down the spine of any club, on any given day.
An excellent forward pack led by co-captain Matt Scott will test Leeds defence consistently. Scott’s running game is superb and feeds off on Ethan Lowe, James Tamou and Jason Taumalolo. Gavin Cooper adds an extra dimension on the fringes with his size, strength and ability to offload providing opportunities to post points.
On paper the Cowboys seem set to continue the Rhinos poor start to 2016, but it could be the home side in slippery and cold conditions that end up adapting better and giving Super League a rare success in the World Club Challenge.
Rhinos: 1. Zak Hardaker, 22. Ash Handley, 3. Kallum Watkins, 4. Joel Moon, 5. Ryan Hall, 14. Liam Sutcliffe, 25. Jordan Lilley, 8. Keith Galloway, 7. Rob Burrow (c), 10. Adam Cuthbertson, 15. Brett Delaney, 26. Brett Ferres, 16. Brad Singleton, 17. Mitch Garbutt, 18. Jimmy Keinhorst, 20. Anthony Mullally, 21. Josh Walters
Cowboys: 1 Lachlan Coote, 2 Kyle Feldt, 3 Justin O’Neill, 4 Kane Linnett, 5 Antonio Winterstein, 6 Michael Morgan, 7 Johnathan Thurston (co-capt); 8 Matt Scott (co-capt), 9 Jake Granville, 10 James Tamou, 11 Gavin Cooper, 12 Ethan Lowe, 13 Jason Taumalolo, 14 Rory Kostjasyn, 15 John Asiata, 16 Scott Bolton, 17 Ben Hannant.
All weekend NRL and WCC squads here
TV times
Australia – GEM Monday 6am (Sydney time), Monday 5am (Brisbane time)
England – Sunday Sky Sports 1 HD 6:30pm
