Wt players could learn from Chris Heighington
- Thread starter frullens
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@frullens said in [Wt players could learn from Chris Heighington](/post/1496962) said:
Sorry don't subscribe to that trash media organisation so posting of the full article may be beneficial for the learning..
needsanewusername
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Lol Heighno, the man who can’t pick a ball up, has little to teach anyone.
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I get a free subscription with my uni course lol.
The Daily Telegraph - October 23, 2021
Paul Kent
The Chris Heighington story is about as good a place as any to wonder what has become of the Wests Tigers, and what they will become.
It is not a footy story, as such, but a 24-carat tale of a young man who found reward in his effort.
Heighington retired from playing three years ago and now runs his own business getting kids off the lounge and active but, some time next week, he is expected to sign a contract that will bring the Wests Tigers’ past crashing into its present.
The contract will be to fight Tigers’ centre Joey Leilua in Newcastle in December.
The card is being headlined by Paul Gallen, the old warrior and a former teammate of Heighington.
Gallen will fight Manly prop Josh Aloiai in the main event, or at least it is hoped.
The pair are in dispute after Aloiai initially agreed to fighting six three-minute rounds but, after a training setback, has asked for the fight to be switched to four two-minute rounds.
Gallen has gone off, and rightly so.
Every time he fights the rounds seem to advantage his opponent.
It’s the fight before that holds the intrigue, though.
It is like a metaphor for the Tigers themselves.
Earlier this week Leilua shot down a story claiming he was offered a train and trial contract with the Tigers before ending it with a flourish, taking a swipe at coach Michael Maguire.
“Btw, I wouldn’t play for someone that blames the team all the time! And not once himself! #Madge,” he wrote on Instagram.
When Joel Keegan read that, all he could do was look across his gym at Heighington, and at the man he has become, and wonder.
Keegan owns the Complete Boxing gym at West Gosford, where Heighington walked into the moment he decided to fight Leilua and where he has been training him for five days a week since.
He and Heighington went to school together, so he knows his story well.
Character always meant something in Heighington’s world. It was a value that was tangible.
It was measured in how hard you worked and how you treated people and how you responded to setbacks.
And each day when Heighington walks into the gym Keegan sees that character.
He sees it when Heighington gravitates to the kids in the gym that are down in confidence, or struggling with the effort.
He trains beside them, encouraging them, getting them across the line.
Keegan has a good young kid in the gym named Sam Goodman and Heighington watches him constantly, seeing what works and how to execute it.
For the kid that wasn’t desired, Heighington found desire was the key to it all.
Heighington was in and out of first grade in 2003 and 2004 and then early in 2005 he thought he had secured his spot when he was driving to Parramatta Stadium to take on the Eels in the 5.30pm Saturday game.
His phone rang.
“Heighno,” said Sheens, “I don’t know how to tell you this, but you’re playing reserve grade.
“You need to get to Henson Park straight away. You’ll get there for the second half.”
Heighington thinks a lot about that phone call.
“I thought it was a test of character,” he says.
He trusted, and whatever Sheens wanted he gave him, and because of that this young kid desired by no-one went on to play more than 300 games, with two premierships.
“Today,” Heighington says, “a lot of kids would have called their manager after that phone call and told them to get them out of there.
“I had some thoughts but I powered on and the next week I was back in first grade.
“I don’t think I got dropped for another nine or 10 years after that.”
Keegan sees Sheens in Heighington every day in the gym.
“My biggest rap on him is his coachability - he brings no ego to a session,” Keegan says.
“He has done most of his training with one of my young guns Sam Goodman and hangs off every word Sam says and watches everything he does.
“When the sparring has been tough and he has been given a lesson he doesn’t look for other answers.
“He sticks to what I’m asking him to do until it’s better. He has been a great example to my young fighters.”
It is a dedication to the coaching that is missing from the Tigers at the moment.
Sheens is heading back to the club and will find it in nothing like the shape he left it.
The Tigers were a club built on work from their own hands.
When the training facilities began to look a little shabby, the club could not afford a freshen up so Sheens, then the head coach, and his assistant Royce Simmons, gathered a few other footy staff together and spent part of their summer giving it a fresh coat of paint.
Now, the club is in superb financial condition. A new $75 million high performance centre is being built, but it has also lost all its soul.
Maguire has tried to bring hard work to the club and the players are resisting. Not all, but enough to have influence.
Leilua was example number one, and he is now out the door.
How Sheens and Maguire work together as a team will be a storyline next season, in a season where Maguire is coaching for his future with a roster not completely convinced.
Hopefully Sheens can bring them together.
Hopefully, he can make the players realise the value of coaching, like Heighington did.
“He is the type of bloke who has appreciated every coach he has ever had,” Keegan says of Heighington.
“Which is very rare,” he adds.
************
The Daily Telegraph - October 23, 2021
Paul Kent
The Chris Heighington story is about as good a place as any to wonder what has become of the Wests Tigers, and what they will become.
It is not a footy story, as such, but a 24-carat tale of a young man who found reward in his effort.
Heighington retired from playing three years ago and now runs his own business getting kids off the lounge and active but, some time next week, he is expected to sign a contract that will bring the Wests Tigers’ past crashing into its present.
The contract will be to fight Tigers’ centre Joey Leilua in Newcastle in December.
The card is being headlined by Paul Gallen, the old warrior and a former teammate of Heighington.
Gallen will fight Manly prop Josh Aloiai in the main event, or at least it is hoped.
The pair are in dispute after Aloiai initially agreed to fighting six three-minute rounds but, after a training setback, has asked for the fight to be switched to four two-minute rounds.
Gallen has gone off, and rightly so.
Every time he fights the rounds seem to advantage his opponent.
It’s the fight before that holds the intrigue, though.
It is like a metaphor for the Tigers themselves.
Earlier this week Leilua shot down a story claiming he was offered a train and trial contract with the Tigers before ending it with a flourish, taking a swipe at coach Michael Maguire.
“Btw, I wouldn’t play for someone that blames the team all the time! And not once himself! #Madge,” he wrote on Instagram.
When Joel Keegan read that, all he could do was look across his gym at Heighington, and at the man he has become, and wonder.
Keegan owns the Complete Boxing gym at West Gosford, where Heighington walked into the moment he decided to fight Leilua and where he has been training him for five days a week since.
He and Heighington went to school together, so he knows his story well.
Character always meant something in Heighington’s world. It was a value that was tangible.
It was measured in how hard you worked and how you treated people and how you responded to setbacks.
And each day when Heighington walks into the gym Keegan sees that character.
He sees it when Heighington gravitates to the kids in the gym that are down in confidence, or struggling with the effort.
He trains beside them, encouraging them, getting them across the line.
Keegan has a good young kid in the gym named Sam Goodman and Heighington watches him constantly, seeing what works and how to execute it.
For the kid that wasn’t desired, Heighington found desire was the key to it all.
Heighington was in and out of first grade in 2003 and 2004 and then early in 2005 he thought he had secured his spot when he was driving to Parramatta Stadium to take on the Eels in the 5.30pm Saturday game.
His phone rang.
“Heighno,” said Sheens, “I don’t know how to tell you this, but you’re playing reserve grade.
“You need to get to Henson Park straight away. You’ll get there for the second half.”
Heighington thinks a lot about that phone call.
“I thought it was a test of character,” he says.
He trusted, and whatever Sheens wanted he gave him, and because of that this young kid desired by no-one went on to play more than 300 games, with two premierships.
“Today,” Heighington says, “a lot of kids would have called their manager after that phone call and told them to get them out of there.
“I had some thoughts but I powered on and the next week I was back in first grade.
“I don’t think I got dropped for another nine or 10 years after that.”
Keegan sees Sheens in Heighington every day in the gym.
“My biggest rap on him is his coachability - he brings no ego to a session,” Keegan says.
“He has done most of his training with one of my young guns Sam Goodman and hangs off every word Sam says and watches everything he does.
“When the sparring has been tough and he has been given a lesson he doesn’t look for other answers.
“He sticks to what I’m asking him to do until it’s better. He has been a great example to my young fighters.”
It is a dedication to the coaching that is missing from the Tigers at the moment.
Sheens is heading back to the club and will find it in nothing like the shape he left it.
The Tigers were a club built on work from their own hands.
When the training facilities began to look a little shabby, the club could not afford a freshen up so Sheens, then the head coach, and his assistant Royce Simmons, gathered a few other footy staff together and spent part of their summer giving it a fresh coat of paint.
Now, the club is in superb financial condition. A new $75 million high performance centre is being built, but it has also lost all its soul.
Maguire has tried to bring hard work to the club and the players are resisting. Not all, but enough to have influence.
Leilua was example number one, and he is now out the door.
How Sheens and Maguire work together as a team will be a storyline next season, in a season where Maguire is coaching for his future with a roster not completely convinced.
Hopefully Sheens can bring them together.
Hopefully, he can make the players realise the value of coaching, like Heighington did.
“He is the type of bloke who has appreciated every coach he has ever had,” Keegan says of Heighington.
“Which is very rare,” he adds.
************
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Hope Heighno beats Joey to a pulp.
GNR4LIFE
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Was that 5 30 game in 05? If so, I was there. Farah scored a 70m solo try in the first set of the match. Was all down hill after that.
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@gnr4life said in [Wt players could learn from Chris Heighington](/post/1496985) said:
That’s the one :+1:
GNR4LIFE
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@kingrobbie said in [Wt players could learn from Chris Heighington](/post/1496986) said:
I remember it well. The ticket machines malfunctioned, and we didn’t get to our seats till 20 mins into the first half.
innsaneink
Well-known member
Yeah I was there that night too....left early...Farah scored two
Keegan is a good trainer, Umina PCYC and Sam Goodman goes hard....Heighno will slaughter Leilua
Keegan is a good trainer, Umina PCYC and Sam Goodman goes hard....Heighno will slaughter Leilua
G
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@kingrobbie said in [Wt players could learn from Chris Heighington](/post/1496981) said:
He'll take him comfortably IMO. Heighno had some talent with the gloves growing up. Joey's best attributes as far as his hands are concerned is smashing burgers.
mike
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DT just filling it’s Wests Tigers click bait quota once again.
twentyforty
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Always saw Heighno as a player with more ticker than skilful ability. He left it all on the park.
happy_tiger
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I just remember Roosters 2010 ....over and over and over again .....
And wonder what I learnt from that ....
Well I learnt I'd rather be losing semis ...that not making them .....over and over and over again
And wonder what I learnt from that ....
Well I learnt I'd rather be losing semis ...that not making them .....over and over and over again
@happy_tiger said in [Wt players could learn from Chris Heighington](/post/1497156) said:
We learnt that a Prop can break from the scrum before the ball was out
happy_tiger
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@geo said in [Wt players could learn from Chris Heighington](/post/1497163) said:
Happens all the time ...play on ...fall on the ball ..easiest skill in the game ...total lack of desire if you can't manage that .....
happy_tiger
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@geo said in [Wt players could learn from Chris Heighington](/post/1497163) said:
Actually the game is on Fox @9.00 am for this who need to relive the horrors
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