DARIUS Boyd spent much of last year’s Four Nations tournament on the booze with Kangaroo second-stringers Todd Carney and Anthony Watmough after being overlooked by Tim Sheens for the Test team. Now it’s payback time.
The Clive Churchill Medallist from St George Illawarra’s grand final victory not only lines up against Sheens in tomorrow night’s blockbuster qualifying final but also the man who stole his green and gold jersey - Tigers winger Lote Tuqiri.
At the time, Sheens was accused of personally favouring his own Wests Tigers player over the grand final man-of-the-match and regular winger in Queensland’s all-conquering State of Origin team.
Last night a furious Sheens accused The Daily Telegraph of regurgitating a bitter old story, declaring “I’m not going to get involved that stuff. I’m coaching the Wests Tigers, not Australia.” He then suggested I ring the selectors to ask about Boyd’s omission, before angrily saying he had nothing left to speak about “on the record”.
Boyd was known to be upset about last year’s Four Nations snubbing and again being overlooked for Brett Morris and Jharal Yow Yeh in the Anzac Test this year on the Gold Coast.
“Of course he was upset,” said a high-placed Dragons source.
"But don’t bother ringing him to talk about it.
“He wants to go to England with Sheens so he’s not going to bag him or start talking about getting revenge. He wants to play well every weekend, especially so in a qualifying final.”
Selectors included Boyd in the original 20-man squad for the series but from that point Sheens chose the 17-man outfits for each of the Tests against New Zealand, England and PNG, and the final against the Kiwis.
Almost 40,000 tickets had last night been sold for the clash between the premiership’s hottest rivals at ANZ Stadium tomorrow night.
Officials are hoping for a crowd in excess of 50,000.
What a loser. I hope the Tigers smash him.