Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2018 i Inside Sport

SOME sad news to share this month: if you’re a long-time reader of Inside Sport, you will definitely know the work of photographer Warren Clarke. Warren was our go-to snapper for many years, an adventurous soul, South Sydney NRL diehard and knowledgeable fan of the fight game. In 2006, he won an Australian Sports Commission Award for best photography, for his work for this magazine at the first Anthony Mundine-Danny Green fight (an example of which is below). Warren’s last assignment for us was in 2015, and had spent the last few years travelling in Asia, adding to what was already an exquisite photo roll. So it was no small shock that we heard late last month that Warren had died, surrounded by his family in Brisbane. He had been…

“The domino effect of player movements over the summer was of the kind I have never witnessed before.” Alright, alright, I know. Opinions are like backsides. We’ve all got one ... but here’s the deal. I’ve received a special request to “bare” mine in relation to what is a fast-approaching National Rugby League season, right here, right now. So thanks for coming, summer of cricket, A-League, NBL, Australian tennis open and the like. It’s time to get down to the serious business of taking a stab at what is going to unfold over the next seven months. When we left you in 2017, it was all hail the Melbourne Storm. They capped off one of the greatest modern-day seasons by any club with grand final glory over the determined North…

THERE’S no room for slackers when you’re the best (little) club in football’s multicultural heartland. At East Bankstown FC in south-west Sydney it’s all hands, feet – and whatever else you have handy – on deck. One of the oldest clubs in the district, EBFC turned 75 last year. It has just over 300 members and more than half of them are juniors aged between four and 12. But that’s no barrier to mucking in when there’s a job to do. Says committee member, registrar and club canteen manager Issy Nohra: “Our aim is to be mentors to the kids and make sure they are encouraged to participate, be good community members and also to give back. “We encourage a lot of young members to be involved in our club…

HOW THEY’LL FINISH 1 North Queensland Cowboys 2 Sydney Roosters 3 Melbourne Storm 4 Brisbane Broncos 5 Cronulla Sharks 6 Penrith Panthers 7 Parramatta Eels 8 St George Illawarra Dragons 9 Canberra Raiders 10 Manly Sea Eagles 11 Gold Coast Titans 12 South Sydney Rabbitohs 13 Newcastle Knights 14 Canterbury Bulldogs 15 Wests Tigers 16 New Zealand Warriors Grand Final Cowboys defeat Roosters 1 North Queensland Cowboys Back in the saddle The rap on North Queensland in the past: no Johnathan Thurston, no chance. But they buried that notion for good with a stirring run to last year’s grand final, even after losing Thurston mid-season and white-knuckling their way into the eighth and last finals spot. Even after the loss in the decider to Melbourne, the Cowboys had earned league-wide…

REAL SCRUMS The ’47 SCRUM Tee will be your new favourite NRL T-shirt. Made from 100-percent ring-spun cotton, this tee is not only soft and comfortable, but it’s incredibly durable. Featuring a large distressed screen-print graphic, 47 is celebrating all things “retro” with its SCRUM Tee range. This style of tee is available across all 16 NRL teams and is a must-have for the 2018 NRL Season. RRP $49.99. Available at www.47brand.com.au ON THE REBOUND The SKLZ Quickster Soccer Trainer sets up quickly, stands up to the hardest passes and stores easily. Lightweight yet durable, this multi-touch rebounder helps players develop their skills in ways that leaves all other rebounders flat. RRP $199. Visit www.sklz.com.au to find out more. TRAIN LIKE A STAR The SKLZ Star-Kick helps young players develop…

Chasing 174 with only four overs remaining, the Melbourne Renegades were 4-100. The Adelaide Strikers’ Rashid Khan was bowling to Dwayne Bravo ... The West Indian dynamo smashed one toward the deep, long-off fence. Ben Laughlin hauled it in on the boundary – too close, in fact. With his momentum about to take him over the rope, he tossed it backhand up the sideline ... ... Where some 20m along the boundary, team-mate Jake Weatherald dived to catch Laughlin’s Hail Mary. From the comm box, Damien Fleming’s hyperbole wasn’t unwarranted: “We have seen the greatest outfield catch ever taken.”…

“For now, anyone can dream – especially given the remarkable narratives of the last two seasons.” The JLT Community Series has no premier, no ladder and no grand final. The importance of winning and losing varies depending on which club you’re talking to. Some use the preseason competition as dress rehearsal, others simply see the format as a mix ’n’ match opportunity to blood young players. The latter perspective renders the scoreboard irrelevant and AFLX muddies the waters further. For most fans, winning is secondary in preseason. What supporters crave is hope. Anything to make them believe 2018 could be the year. Hope will either lead to happiness or helplessness a few months down the track. But for now, anyone can dream – especially given the remarkable narratives of the…

Heard this one before: Super Rugby undergoes yet another format change for 2018 as the provincial rugby comp trims back to 15 teams. We hardly knew ye, Western Force. But David Pocock is back from his sabbatical, as is Kurtley Beale from his lucrative sojourn. Another return that would be welcomed: Australian sides getting wins over New Zealand teams – and we’re so hungry for them, we’d even count victories by Japan’s Sunwolves, replacing the Force in the Aussie conference. Crusaders $4.50 Remarkably, it had been nine years since the Canterbury franchise – Super Rugby’s most successful – had won the premiership, despite seven finals appearance in the intervening seasons. But break through they did, losing only once and winning the decider on the road in the Joburg heights. Even…

PERTH SATURDAY, 10 MARCH For most of us, it’s a bit of a hike to the starting line for our year-long rugby league odyssey, but the trip will be well worth the effort and bucks invested for east coast-based fans planning on trekking across the Nullarbor. The latter two-thirds of the first Super Saturday of the 2018 NRL home and away season will take place at the city’s brand-spanking Optus Stadium. Like the arrival of any new-born, this baby has caused a lot of excitement amongst the Perth family. While we’re on that simile train, like a proud dad, WA Premier Mark McGowan recently raised the idea of the state’s 60,000-seat venue (already nicknamed The Craypot by locals) even hosting the AFL Grand Final one day. We know every baby…

When you think of rugby in 2017, you picture the typical Aussie fan sitting in a corner, knees held tightly to chest, rocking back and forth mumbling “make it stop, make it stop”. Yeah, it was a bit like that at times. The axing of the Western Force came at great cost: friendships, faith and trust in the national body. Forgiveness will be hard won. On the park, Australia’s Super Rugby teams played Kiwi sides 26 times and won exactly ... none. Not once, nada, zilch, zero. So for all sorts of reasons, the new Super Rugby season can’t come quickly enough. We were promised the axing of a team would make Australia more competitive. On paper there’s a lot to like about the Aussies, and with some early wins…

WHEN WE catch Braith Anasta, he’s still riding the high of the birth of his new daughter, Gigi. He admits he hadn’t thought much yet about the coming rugby league season, but that would soon change – the 288-gamer for Canterbury, the Roosters and Wests Tigers has made a seamless transition to the media since his NRL retirement in 2014, working as a commentator for Fox Sports. It’s a job he had prepared for while he was still playing, and one he relishes: “It's the closest I can get to being in the game, the pressure of live TV.” In many respects, Anasta’s playing career tracked a path that can be distinctly observed in rugby league stardom today: from teen hotshot to early success, a big-money move to overbearing public…

“There’s a lot of depth in our club across the positions. Everyone’s been training very intensely. We have 30 blokes who are putting their hands up for 17 jerseys.” What effect did winning the Wests Tigers’ Kelly-Barnes player-of-the-year award last season have on your approach to the game? For example, this year are you looking to really inspire the players around you by leading by example? Yeah, the big focus for me now is trying to influence the younger players on our team; see that they train hard, have a good work ethic. It will be about trying to encourage high standards at our club and do all I can to encourage the younger boys and some of the other players to try and prepare as well as we can…

It was 50 years ago that the IOC introduced drug testing to the Olympic Games at Mexico City 1968. For the first 30 years, disqualifications resulting in the loss of medals were relatively rare, the most famous example being Ben Johnson being stripped of the gold medal after the men’s 100m at the Seoul Games of 1988. But since Sydney 2000, the number of disqualifications leading to medal reallocation has spiked markedly. Nine Olympic Winter and Summer Games have been held since 2000. Only twice, at Torino 2006 and Rio 2016, have disqualifications not led to the reallocation of at least two gold medals and multiple other medals. Athletics (48 medals), weightlifting (46) and cross-country skiing (13) have been the sports most impacted by cheats. In all, 20 Olympic sports…

No player laid on more tackles in the NRL last season than St George Illawarra’s Cameron McInnes. The 23-year-old hooker made an astonishing 1155 tackles, which meant he was in an average of 44 car-crash-level collisions every match (and that’s not counting the ones when he has the ball!) But that comes with the territory – or defending the territory, as it were – in the middle of the field. McInnes, who has played rep level for NSW City, shares with Inside Sport what it takes to be an elite league defender – his attitude to defence, communication, training and tips he’s learned to become a tough-as-teak tackling machine. THE RIGHT ATTITUDE My whole life since I started playing footy, I’ve always been a pretty capable defender and it’s been…