Ricky Stuart didn’t’ believe John Bateman when he first declared he’d be available to play against Canterbury – but the Canberra coach wasn’t at all surprised by the Englishman’s match-winning performance.
“That’s him, there was no way he wasn’t going to have an 80-minute effort,” Stuart said after the Raiders’ 12-10 win over Canterbury.
Bateman suffered a fractured eye-socket against Penrith four weeks ago and was expected to be sidelined for several more weeks.
But after watching the Green Machine’s 22-16 loss to North Queensland seven days ago from the north of England, Bateman picked up the phone.
MORE: Bulldogs v Raiders: Hudson Young placed on report for alleged eye gouge | Former NRL player Jarryd Hayne joins soccer side on Central Coast, report |
“He rang me last week after the game, he was in England, and he said, ‘I’ll be right to play,” Stuart said post-match.
“And I just thought it was a comment from a player hurting for his mates who’d just lost a game of footy and going through a tough patch but we checked him out with a specialist Thursday.
“I was pretty confident and he was confident of being right and the specialist cleared him.
“He’s got a big influence … but that was a team effort tonight, there wasn’t a bad player on the field for us and that was what’s needed at the moment with a lot of our talent out.”
While Stuart attempted to spread the credit among all 17 players, Bateman’s influence was obvious as the Raiders snapped their three-game losing streak.
Less than a week after flying back from England, he scored a try, ran for 132 metres and made 30-plus tackles to drag the depleted Raiders over the line.
“He’s a very experienced player and when you’re recruiting players I’ve had a real focus on trying to recruit players that have been involved in being a winner – winning teams, winning competitions,” Stuart said.
“… John’s been a winner with Wigan, he’s played Test matches and won.”
Stuart added of the much-needed win: “I’m not getting excited, we’ve had a tough month and we need to go again.
“It’s only early in the competition still but over the next six weeks, whilst I’ve got so many injuries and players out … we just need to string the odd two points together because I don’t want it (the Origin period) to ruin the good start to the season we’ve had.”
