Pre-match the excitable kiddies on The Roar were wetting themselves at the opportunity to jam it right up Brad Thorn, having been worked up into a lather over a period of weeks by acolytes reminding them of that horrid fellow's vendetta against Our Your Quadie.
Show them vision of a couple of Canterbury matches from the early 2000's and they couldn't tell you which one was Brad and which one was Reuben. They express themselves in a manner worthy of your typical Collingwood supporter, citing a non-existent rivalry on the field, naked anti-New Zealander racism and Thorn's stubborn bigotry in selecting a side which suited him as coach. The last time Quadie cried in similar circumstances his handlers had him pronounce the coach as "tokix", after spending a week to have him remember it and rehearse how to say it.
I think the only time Thorn might have noticed Laptop Cooper on the field, during his eight or nine times losing to the All Blacks, was when he spotted him kneeing a fallen Richie McCaw's head while no-one was watching - Thorn missed by a whisker sending the chancer into Friday week. That certainly does not qualify as rivalry.
He hasn't learned how to tackle, he still kicks (and passes) out on the full and yet the hyperbole is now being cranked up for the campaign against Michael Cheika, who couldn't select an acceptable team so long as his arks points to the ground, just like Robbie Deans before him and just like, in recent seasons, Daryl Gibson, Dan McKellar, David Wessells or Tim Sampson.
Cheika worked out some time back that one defensive turnstile in the mid field is luxury enough but that hasn't registered. I suspect (hope) that, like Brad Thorn, he has heard the quote from NFL coach Buddy Ryan "If you listen to the fans, you'll be sitting up there with them."
Toulon owner Mourad Boudjellal delivered a boot up the Khyber Pass half way through the li'l fella's contract period, spluttering "Sacre bloody bleu, talk about vin ordinaire mate mes amis - it's difficult to go from foie gras to pâté!" He was missing Jonny Wilkinson's exceptionalism and Tana Umaga's before him - there is the standard to be met.
Wayne Smith of The Australian sets the bar low to accommodate an adequate low level performance by his preferred 10, punctuated by several characteristic bloopers, while two undisciplined local outfits scrambled loosely about the park in an incoherent display. He hallucinates:
Triumphant return for Cooper
"Quade Cooper orchestrated a Test match-like intensity from the Melbourne Rebels to shut out the Queensland Reds 32-13."
I watched the second half closely and it was unremarkable stuff from just about everyone, 25 weeks out from the World Cup.
