BY DAN

Canberra’s coach Ricky Stuart will tell you he’s had his eyes on two horizons this season. One that is immediate, the coming of the night and the requirements that brings immediately. On that vista is the imperative to win now, to make sure the dwindling light of Elliott Whitehead, Jordan Rapana and Josh Papalii isn’t wasted on uncompetitive teams. The other perspective is focused clearly on the future. On what matters next year, the year after and beyond.

Stuart himself puts it like this:

You can look at that as a very inexperienced team today. Or you can look at how the future is bright in regards to the youth we have in those [spine] positions. We certainly have a ‘win now’ attitude. But I’ve got to have a ‘win later’ attitude too.

We’ve seen this play out over this year. Ethan Strange and Chevy Stewart are the most obvious beneficiaries (and who Stick was mostly referring to above). Canberra have also revealed recently that Eels half Ethan Sanders is to be added to the pile from next year. Strange has proven he’s ready, particularly in playing alongside a dominant half like Jamal Fogarty. Stewart has had an output more in keeping with his ‘two games and one birthday as an adult” status. He’s more represented that dual horizon mentality – the need to persist with imperfection in the search of something greater down the line.

The logic is pretty solid. Canberra has a three-tiered roster. An older set of players from the ‘silver era’ that are currently either phasing out of the side over the next few years (like Whitehead, Papalii and Rapana), or solidly in their primes (Fogarty, Tapine). a group in the middle just entering theirs (Horsburgh, Hosking, Woolford, Levi, Kris, Timoko, Young, Guler) and then a cohort of young players that’s more a movement. All 23 or under, all elite talents with seemingly endless upside. Strange and Stewart are the most highly touted but it also includes people like Trey Mooney and Ata Mariota, Xavier Savage, Michael Asomua, Bert Hopoate, Kaeo Weekes, Adrian Trevilayan, Hohepa Puru, Morgan Smithies and Simi Sasagi. Add Ethan Sanders to the mix for next season and 43 per cent of the roster will be in this group.

Stuart is right to be thinking long-term with this group. As we’ve seen with the bumpy and ‘fits-and-start’ development of several members of that younger cohort (and the middle one to be fair), it’s not as simple as talent + game time = success. Xavier Savage has never looked more at home than he does on the wing right now. When he started on the wing two seasons ago he looked genuinely confounded by the relatively simple requirements of the role. A year away from the glare of first grade seems to have done the trick. Ata Mariota has been a sometimes player, until necessity meant that he’s found his opportunity on the right edge often this year. This time last year when occasionally put in the same position he looked bewildered. That a middle has been passable there is astounding.

The point is that it’s an investment, but not in the house prices sense. There’s ups-and-downs, and patience is required as young players learn in front of our eyes. Chevy Stewart learned lessons against the Broncos. He followed Chilli Healer’s patented process for getting back at it (Have a little cry… ✓ Pick yourself up… ✓ Dust yourself off… ✓ And keep going!) and was much improved against the Sharks. That apparently earned a break and perhaps further questions.

But it’s a fine balance. Like everyone’s favourite yarn-spinner Erasmus used to tell me in the front bar at All Bar Nun “duos insequens lepore’s neutrum capit”. There’s always a risk in that searching for the best tomorrow you never actually go ‘all-in’ on today. There’s an unending number of examples of this in sport, where coaches and organisations promise a better tomorrow that never comes. Young players don’t develop quick enough for the older players timeline, either because of a lack of opportunity or lack of fit with bigger names.

If there’s a typology for failure here it’s usually when the big names are older and need to eat first. But this side will be different with nearly all the ‘critical’ spots held by younger players. This isn’t foolproof either (see the Moses/Brooks/Teddy Tigers). But there’s something to be said for the elder statesmen put in positions that require cool heads (like Fogarty at 7) and older bodies (like Tapine in the front line).

There is also always the risks of self-service and fan service. Coaches and administrators use the promise of the future to extend lenience in the present, or to cover-up the faults they’ve built into the roster. That doesn’t seem to be Stuart’s modus operandi. He doesn’t need to find an excuse to extend his time in Canberra; the board seems to fall over themselves every few years to keep him around.

There’s a bit there for us as fans. We’re all guilty of seeing greatness in the potential. And yes building by bulk has happened before. We’ve just watched the Panthers and now the Broncos do exactly that. It’s important to remember these are remarkable achievements and not given. Tomorrow is promised to no one. Shit if Reece Walsh gets injured maybe this Brisbane team falls apart, never wins a chip and it’s spoken about in hushed tones and wistful laments like the 2001 Eels or the 2005 Eels or the 2009 Eels (I’m just making myself laugh at this point).

We won’t know what we have for some time. It will take a minor miracle for it to all work out. Right now that it feels possible. Patience is a virtue but today is a present.

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