The NRL will name the 14th Immortal on Wednesday night and among them are modern and past legends of the game. These are the front-runners.
CAMERON SMITH: The Melbourne legend played a premiership-record 430 games and never made a foolish move on a rugby league field. His former teammate and mentor Matt Geyer once famously said that if you could GPS plot every move the crafty No.9 made on a footy field and then review where he went, all his steps would be the right ones. “Unfortunately for the opposition he often knows what they are going to do before they do it. He has just got that sixth sense that no one has seen before,” Geyer said. Not the fastest. Not the strongest. Smith was simply the best.
RON COOTE: There is sentiment that Coote, one of the greatest locks along with John Raper to lace a boot, is an Immortal omission that needs rectifying. Coote won four premierships with South Sydney and two with Eastern Suburbs. The legendary Arthur Beetson referred to Coote in his autobiography as “the greatest grand final player in the world”. He didn’t stop there with his adulation: “Cootie was the best of my time and a wonderful contributor to two clubs – Easts and Souths. He was a two-club player and just a class person, one of nature’s gentlemen.”
DARREN LOCKYER: Lockyer was a genius as a fullback before switching to five-eighth and becoming equally as dominant on his way to four premierships with Brisbane in a 355-game career. Like Smith he was a prime mover in Queensland’s golden generation of State of Origin dominance, The skill and grace with which he played was poetry in motion. Lockyer was the ultimate closer of a game who would produce his best when the match was on the line. Often underestimated, due to his cool demeanour, was his toughness and resilience. A master of his craft who made the difficult look like a cakewalk.
ALLAN LANGER: The larrikin of the rugby league world was also its shining light throughout the 1990s. They called him the “money man” at Brisbane, where he won four titles as captain. Langer always had the “money” play with his magical short kicking and won countless games on his own with his off-the-cuff running game. His former coach Wayne Bennett once said he would already have been an Immortal if he was from NSW. Langer was also a maestro of the State of Origin arena from 1987 through to 2002. “I believe he is the best Bronco and the most influential player in my time here,” Bennett said in 2018. “At the height of his playing career he was 72kg and he played against some big men in that era, but he shone. He was a star for a decade. In my opinion, he was the best player in the game for a decade.”