BY CURTIS WOODWARD

@woodward_curtis

Can we deal in some reality to begin with? Let’s start with the fact that Daly Cherry-Evans is the incumbent Australian Kangaroos halfback, he is a premiership-winner and current captain of Manly-Warringah and represented his state of Queensland on 13 occasions.

Oh and he is also the President of the Rugby League Players’ Association.

Cherry-Evans is probably the most well-spoken current player in the competition. He speaks with respect, insight and really does care about the game.

On Sunday, Cherry-Evans was asked about the current civil war rugby league finds itself in.

He was asked about ARLC chairman Peter V’landys and the extreme changes to the NRL which has seen dozens of players sin-binned, sent off and suspended in recent weeks.

Nobody wants to see a player concussed.

Illegal play will happen in rugby league.

A tiny fraction will be intentional, but the majority is accidental. Split-second actions and reactions played out by some of the most physical and intense athletes on the planet.

Should V’landys be ousted as chairman of the ARLC?

Daly?

 “He has always said he is the ‘players’ man’, right now I would like to see Peter be that man for us,” Cherry-Evans said.

“That’s not for me to decide… that’s a massive call.

“We’re talking about someone who has done so much in their industries. He is obviously an extremely qualified businessman and I have so much respect for what he did in the Covid period.

“Do I think he should go? No. That’s not for me to say, no way.”

But what about the frustration of fans and many experts?

“I think as a game we have backed ourselves into a corner here, unfortunately. Now we’ve got to come up with these ideas and miracles to get out of. I have always said I think we’ve just got such a fantastic product the game of rugby league, and it’s been changed dramatically. It’s probably the lack of acknowledgment from the NRL that is probably the most frustrating thing for players.

“As a game we backed ourselves into the corner with the rule changes. What do we do to get out of it? We have to talk about it. Not necessarily through the media, not necessarily through the public.

“We have a really great product so let’s just get it back on track and have everyone cheering for their teams and excited to get back to the footy. And try to take out the contentious decisions and momentum swings.”

Constructive words from one of the most respected players in the country.

Not surprisingly, the PVL Army continued to fuel the propaganda machine and turned their attention to Cherry-Evans on NRL360 on Tuesday night.

There was nothing constructive about it.

It was boardroom bullying, venom-spewing, all played out on a national broadcast by the panellists.

When the NRL needed a confidence boost during COVID-19, V’landys was the man. He beat on his chest and drummed up the game. Took countless shots at the AFL and got the NRL back up and running again before many other sports around the world.

All good.

But that isn’t a license or an excuse to run the sport like some sort of dictatorship.

Nobody is untouchable in rugby league – especially the bloke warming the chairman’s seat in the commission.

Britain needed Winston Churchill in World War II.

They got rid of him when peace prevailed.

Instead of measured, thought-out responses to Cherry-Evans’ warranted view, those on the NRL360 panel went completely ape-shit like DCE was some nobody that didn’t deserve to be heard.

How dare he?!

After all, V’landys “saved” the NRL… remember?

Please.

Rugby league has been killed a hundred times over since 1908 and it never needed one, solitarily saviour, much less a guy from the horseracing industry.

The ‘big lie technique’ in politics is described as: “a gross distortion or misrepresentation of the facts, especially when used as a propaganda device by a politician or official body.”

2GB’s Mark Levy wrote an article for the Wide World of Sports saying NRL players would be standing in line at Centrelink if it wasn’t for Sir Peter.

Ray Hadley, of 2GB (which is owned by Channel Nine), demanded on NRL360 that players should “pull their heads in” and simply start backing V’landys and to “get over it”.

This was a good one from the veteran caller.

“I’ve been broadcasting the game for almost 40 years and I love the game, I love watching the game, but I don’t like seeing young men knocked out by head-high tackles and it has to stop.”

News flash.

Players will always get knocked out playing rugby league and it will never stop.

It’s physics.

What should have been an amicable participation between all stakeholders in the game about how best to keep our players safe has turned into an agenda-driven circus.

The other fact about all this is that the game has never been safer, anyway.

Back to the ‘big lie’.

“I was bewildered with what Daly Cherry-Evans had to say after the game on Sunday, and the fact that he said, ‘Peter V’landys has always said he’s a man for the players, so let’s see you do it Pete, let’s see you be a man of the players’,” News Corp’s Paul Crawley bemoaned.

“Well last year, Peter V’landys saved the players and saved the game $400 million. $400 million so Daly Cherry-Evans can have his $1.2 million salary and all the players could keep their jobs and around the country and around the world good people, men, women, children, were losing their jobs left, right, and centre, and V’landys kept this game afloat.”

In no way is what V’landys helped do last year and what is happening now in 2021 connected.

‘Ah well, Pete did a good job last year so f*** anyone that dares question him now!’

Is that where we are at?

Johnnie Cochran had no clue.

On the first day of the murder trial of O.J. Simpson, the infamous lawyer should have known better in his opening address.

“But Judge! He was a Hollywood star and NFL MVP!”

Well, that’s that.

Forget everything else.

One expert in the game with some common sense is Phil Gould.

One punter on Twitter on Tuesday accused Gus (who currently has me blocked for some reason), of influencing and supporting ‘head knocks and concussions’.

“How am I supporting head knocks and concussions?” Gould hit back.

“I have retired players who were more susceptible to repeated concussions. I’m simply balancing a lot of the hysteria and misinformation around head knocks and concussion. You are just being a jerk.”

Cleary holds lead in Beetson Raudonikis Medal

Sadly the legendary Steve Mortimer has come out and said that he is battling dementia from a life in footy.

Although it is incredibly heartbreaking to hear about the iconic halfback, it is hard to compare Mortimer’s era and what was allowed then to the sport we have now.

The current players are quite right to question V’landys position.

We’re all thinking it.

Unfortunately, it appears we’ll never get a sit-down between the untouchable emperor we don’t need and the rest of us poor nobodies who apparently have no idea.

@woodward_curtis