Melbourne Storm vs Brisbane Broncos grand final gives us no one to love or hate. And that’s not very rugby league

First, though, good on Melbourne and Brisbane for swamping Sydney’s hotels with much-needed business.

The streets are flowing with XXXX and Melbourne Bitter. Happy holiday faces have arrived for a long weekend to shove it up the big smoke and then go home again, satisfied that Brisbane and Melbourne are so much better. Like much about this grand final, the result is win-win, or, from another perspective, lose-lose.

It’s not that the Storm or the Broncos are objects of differentiated hatred. If only they were.

I know plenty of Sydney league fans who hate the Storm, but they also hate the Broncos. It’s not the Storm or the Broncos; it’s the Storm and the Broncos. Whatever feelings exist for them come from the same place – the spleen, maybe the gall bladder.

They’re both creations of News Corp to disrupt the old Sydney order – rich kids born on third base.

Both were built on greenfield sites, and both have prospered without the burden of ancestral feuds and ancestral toilet facilities.

The biggest challenges for Brisbane and Melbourne have been nouveau-riche challenges: warding off hubris and keeping a lid on the sheer glee of being the only teams in big cities.

The clubs are like irritating cousins you only see at Christmas, and nowadays, because they’ve done better in life than the rest of the family, Christmas is always at their place. In Queensland.

Although Broncos-Storm is Queensland versus Queensland, that’s not the thing that pairs them in rugby league emotions. Neutrals would like to see the Cowboys, Dolphins or Titans in the grand final.

We’re not anti-Queensland; we’re anti-success. The feeling is pure envy, the core and honourable driving force of rugby league for 117 years.

Is it hatred, or just … meh? Hatred would add interest. But many of us would have to reach too deep into our spleen or gall bladder to find more than indifference towards the Storm and the Broncos.

They’re both really good to watch, part of a generation that has lifted rugby league to unprecedented popularity.

Reece Walsh and Cameron Munster are rugby league geniuses. Payne Haas is what you’d get if you could breed Greg Inglis with Glenn Lazarus. Adam Reynolds, Ezra Mam and Ben Hunt versus Jahrome Hughes, Ryan Papenhuyzen and Harry Grant.

What’s not to love? Or, from a different perspective, what’s not to hate? And this is the problem: if you love/hate Walsh, you also almost certainly love/hate Munster.

Coaches are (too) often the dominant personalities in rugby league, but Craig Bellamy and Michael Maguire are related through the same Canberra family, winners with a gift for creating siege mentalities.

Bellamy. After all these years, who has the stamina to hate him? Watching him chew off his lips before making an explosive dash for the back of the coaching box as if he had business in the conveniences, somewhere, we stopped laughing at him and started laughing with him.

No, that’s not right – he’s not laughing. But he’s a lovable old ball of angst, who has moved from rugby league’s arch antagonist to its national treasure. He is easily the best coach in any sporting code in Australia, but he doesn’t look like he enjoys a minute of it. How can you not like that?

As for Maguire, his emotional ambition is also to feel some sweet relief from the pain. His last three years with New Zealand, NSW and Brisbane have proved one thesis beyond doubt: the results at Wests Tigers when he was there were not the coach’s fault.

In fact, the Tigers would have been, and have been, worse without Maguire. If a coach’s ability is a quotient of results divided by available talent minus club politics, Maguire belongs up with Wayne Bennett, Ivan Cleary, Ricky Stuart and Des Hasler in the sub-Bellamy class of today’s successful rugby league coaches.

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After such an exciting season, Melbourne v Brisbane doesn’t offer much emotional investment for the neutral, but it does promise a rugby league exhibition.

And here’s the moral of the story. In a code that constantly outdoes itself and becomes more entertaining each year, there’s nothing to expect and nothing to barrack for on Sunday except a great game. And no stress.

It’s all good, it’s all bad, it doesn’t matter. Sport can be so much easier and more enjoyable to watch when you don’t care who wins.

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