Ryan Girdler

Ryan's slaughter can't shoot the Messenger

By PHIL DERRIMAN
Sydney Morning Herald - 9 June 2000

After almost 90 years it might have seemed that Dally Messenger's interstate point-scoring record (he ran up 32 points against Queensland in 1911) was safe forever.

Until two nights ago, that is.

Ryan Girdler did not beat Messenger's mark in the State of Origin on Wednesday, but he did the next best thing: he equalled it to go into league's record book with his name linked with one of the game's immortals.

The two have a lot in common. Messenger was 28 and Girdler is 27. Both occupied more or less the same position on the field: Messenger was inside-centre and Girdler left centre.

The most remarkable coincidence of all is that both kicked 10 goals, earning each 20 points. They also scored almost the same number of tries - three by Girdler and four (then worth three points each) by Messenger. Does the extra try mean that Messenger's feat is the greater of the two? Not necessarily, according to the league historian and statistician David Middleton.

Girdler made, proportionally, a bigger impact on the game than Messenger, scoring one third of his team's tries (three of nine), while Messenger's four were part of a 15-try slaughter of the Queenslanders, clearly feeble opponents in 1911.

Moreover, whereas Girdler succeeded with 10 out of 10 goal-kicking attempts, Messenger must have missed quite a few, given that there would have been 15 conversion attempts and presumably a number of other penalty attempts, too.

In any case, according to Middleton, the two eras are too far separated in time - and the circumstances of the two games too different - to allow any worthwhile comparison.

For instance, Messenger had the advantage, not available to Girdler, of being able to kick goals from scrum penalties. On the other hand, Girdler had the advantage of better equipment (both ball and type of kicking boot), and he arguably had the advantage of advanced technique - namely, around-the-corner kicking.

Messenger had a straight approach and booted the end of the ball with his toe in the old method, still used to good effect by Mal Meninga and others as recently as the 1990s.

Messenger liked to wipe the toe of his boot beforehand on the back of his sock, a mannerism still occasionally seen today, even if Girdler did not do it on Wednesday. Before kicking, too, Messenger secretly coated the ball with resin which he kept in a pocket sewn into his shorts - an admission he made long after retiring.

In the final analysis, Messenger was a once-in-a-generation player, regarded as head and shoulders above his contemporaries. He was a champion goal kicker (he once landed a penalty from 73m out, a feat long afterwards accepted by the Guinness Book of Records), but his fame rests mainly on the brilliance and innovation of his general play.

Middleton recalled yesterday that Messenger used to dive over defenders to get to the line, and he forced a rule change by mastering the art of tossing the ball over the defender's head and running around him to catch it.

Co-record-holder Girdler is in extremely good company.