Paul Green’s playmaking prowess helped him punch above his weight.Credit:Action Photographics
A rare tenacity helped him prosper in a game where the giants grew larger by the day. But an even rarer footballing IQ saw Green’s contribution to the game go far beyond 162 first-grade games and seven Origins for Queensland – which by all and sundry,would have been far more if not for the presence of Allan Langer.
A pilot’s licence,the ability to speak multiple languages and play multiple instruments speak to the natural intelligence he was gifted,then honed.
Nowhere more than on a footy field. Wayne Bennett credits Green with driving the cross-field kick for wingers during the late 1990s,taking advantage of the athletic ability possessed by the likes of Rogers and Andrew Ettingshausen out wide.
“Even last week,” Rogers said of the Cronulla old-boys reunion they both attended,“Greeny was on another level. I like to think I can read the game pretty well,but something happened in the game and he picked it apart in an instant and explained why it had happened.
Paul Green was in charge of the Cowboys for 167 games with the 2015 title coming in his second season as head coach.Credit:Getty
“He had a rare footballing brain and while he was tough,that probably helped him thrive at his size,too. He had to be smarter than the rest of us,and he was.”
At the Cowboys,Green would speak of recruiting different body shapes and sizes in his forward pack. It’s why the 10 extra centimetres James Tamou had on Matt Scott provided a minute,but critical advantage when colliding with defenders.
Through coaching stints at Wynnum-Manly in the Queensland competition,Trent Robinson’s title-winning Roosters staff in 2013,North Queensland and the Maroons,Green always gave the game more thought than most.
“I loved working with Paul for his incredible football mind,passion and humour,” Robinson texted the Herald.
“As good a person as he was a coach,I enjoyed the time Greeny and I had as mates coaching against each other and sharing our views on the game in the years that followed.”
Green will always remain a treasured figure in Townsville thanks to the breakthrough 2015 title he delivered. That he took North Queensland to a grand final just two years later,with co-captains Johnathan Thurston and Scott leading a horrific injury toll,might just be his finest coaching feat of all.
Despite the late lean years that cost him his job,Green’s gift to the game north of the border remains colossal.
It had been set to continue too,Bennett talking to Green just a week ago about joining the Dolphins coaching staff as an assistant next season.
“He did a lot for the state league up here as a player and then as a coach,” Bennett said. “He’s a great rugby league man and a great contributor to the game here in Queensland. There’s just a lot of sad people in the game today.”
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