NATIONAL NINE
Damien Cook runs like a frill-necked Jesus lizard, fleeing all those snakes in that video, you know the one; head back, verily piss-bolting. Johnny Gibbs used to run like that, half out of fear that Tommy Raudonikis would bite him. Gibbo can’t have weighed 70 kegs. Play against Tommy and those mad Magpies, you’d run, too.
There’s a bit more meat on Damien Cook, and a touch less of the startled lizard about his running gait and man-action. He’s a piss-bolter, sure, but it’s controlled piss-bolting. He’s eyes-up, calculating, at speed. Some guys play footy full-on, frothing, eyes like spinning tops. Jimmy Smith played 120 first grade games, mainly for the Roosters, and still marvels that Brad Fittler could do the exceptional, at speed, under pressure, when everyone else was cooked. Chip-and-chase in the 79th minute to win a game because Phil Gould mentioned the fullback plays deep late in a set? Give it to Freddy.
They give it to Cook today because the position he plays, “the nine” (he’s no more a hooker than he is a Gucci handbag), is so pivotal. The nine is the centrifuge. Halves? They ice the plays; win Dally M points. It’s the number-nine who facilitates when these people receive the ball and upon what platter. The Storm is a dynasty because of Cameron Smith. And Cook, today, is up there with Smith and Raiders rake Josh Hodgson, the best of their kind.
Wasn’t always so. Bit of a slow burner, our Cookie. He went to Panthers U/20s as a utility; they didn’t know what he was. He’d played outside-centre in union. The Dragons brought him over, listed him as a second-rower. The list of hookers preferred to Cook included Mitch Rein, Cam King, Nathan Fien,
