The Low-intensity, No-budget Spectacle of the NRL Pre-season

On Saturday night, the Brisbane Broncos’ 19 best players beat the Wigan Warriors 42-12 at DW Stadium, sealing the World Club Series. Thousands of kilometres away, and a few hours earlier, Calum Henderson watched the club’s 17 next-best players beat the Souths Logan Magpies 50-0 in a sparsely attended trial match at Davies Park in South Brisbane.

The Davies Park farmers’ market closed an hour early on Saturday for a game of rugby league. The unassuming park in Brisbane’s West End is also the home of Souths Logan Magpies, one of the fourteen teams who play for the Intrust Super Cup, Queensland’s top level of club competition.

Hosting last year’s NRL runners-up for a pre-season trial match was a big game for the Magpies, even if this wasn’t the ‘real’ Brisbane Broncos. The club’s top players were in the UK for the World Club Series, where a few hours later they would beat Wigan Warriors to clinch the title for Australia. The Broncos side that ran out onto Davies Park just after 6pm, once the oppressive heat of the day had finally given way to twilight, were the next cabs off the rank – players fresh out of the Under-20s vying to impress the coaches, hoping to earn a call-up to first grade once the inevitable injuries and suspensions take their toll throughout the season.

I took a spot on the Broncos goal line, where they received the kick off and immediately disappeared downfield, gaining easy ground and scoring on the first set of the game. Sensing I wasn’t going to see a great deal of action down this end, I made my way down the sideline towards the two-storey clubhouse – a relatively modern building that nonetheless seemed to boast one of the world’s oldest working public address systems.

“TRY BRONCOS” a man shouted into the microphone. The ancient speaker made it sound panicked and urgent, like it should have been followed by an air raid siren. I looked up and saw the polarised lenses of his binoculars fixed on the Broncos players wandering back upfield. “NUMBER FOUR. MARION SEVE. BRONCOS 4. SOUTHS LOGAN NIL.” At halftime he would use the same technique to announce to the 200-300-strong crowd: “TOILETS ARE AVAILABLE IN THE CLUBROOMS.”

I stopped directly behind the goalposts to try and take a nice picture. Nearby two members of the Broncos technical staff leant against the railing and intensely studied the game, offering advice (“shut him down,” “stay square”), encouragement (“great movement”), and occasionally, scorn. “That’s just lazy,” one of them moaned after a missed tackle. “It’s an attitude thing,” the other one agreed. He got on his walkie-talkie to the head trainer. “Give him a rocket mate,” he instructed. “Tell him he’s got one more set and if he doesn’t improve give him the hook.” He got the hook.

They were happier with centre Aaron Whitchurch. “Give Whitty a rap for how hard he’s running,” they told the trainer when he came off for an interchange. “Actually, put him on.” They gave Whitty a short motivational pep talk via radio: “Work hard, be clean.”

The Broncos controlled the game, consistently beating the Magpies one-on-one, and went into halftime up 26-0. They constantly shuffled the pack to try different combinations and keep players fresh. “Do we have a goalkicker?” one of the technical staff wondered at one stage. “Nope,” replied the trainer at the other end of his walkie-talkie. “Ah…” he scanned the field. “Jai [Arrow] can kick.”

The game was played in a good spirit, but perhaps understandably seemed to lose intensity in the second half. I retired to the beer garden for a $5 tin of XXXX Gold which the bar worker opened for me with a teaspoon. To my left a bloke in a Magpies jersey sat in silence but for an occasional “GO MAGPIES;” to my right a middle-aged man attempted to explain the mismatch to his wife. “These Broncos players are probably on $35,000 a year,” he estimated. “The Magpies players probably get $50 a game.”

Many of these young Broncos will return to the Queensland Cup for game time once the first team returns from the UK and the season gets underway. Caleb Timu – returning to rugby league after a two-year Mormon mission – is expected to turn out for the Magpies, but on Saturday he scored a hattrick off the bench for the Broncos as they eased to a 50-0 win under floodlights at Davies Park.