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ALL great coaches have a knack of anticipating the true danger games.
Through a combination of fortune and foresight, Canberra's Ricky Stuart has done exactly that.
Parramatta fans in uproar over missing the chance to 'welcome' their old coach back to Pirtek Stadium next season will be even more infuriated to learn that Stuart played a role in engineering his own great escape from their wrath.
When the Eels signed-off on a four-year deal to transfer a home game to Darwin each season in August, Stuart was still at the helm and recommended Canberra as a preferred opponent.
Then Eels coach Ricky Stuart recommended Canberra as the team to play in Darwin. Source: News Limited
The logic was obvious: accustomed to training in near freezing tempartures in the ACT, the Raiders could be naturally expected to wilt in the ferocious Top End heat.
Furthermore, Canberra were not a rival invested with traditional drawing power.
But all that changed when Stuart defected to the Raiders amid much acrimony a month later.
Suddenly the Eels-Raiders fixture had become the hottest grudge item on the NRL's 2014 calendar - all-but guaranteeing Parramatta's first 20,000 sellout in recent memory.
Even the NRL website bookmarked the fixture for Pirtek Stadium in a piece plugging the "15 must-see clashes of 2014".
"Expect fireworks in this Round 1 meeting as the Eels desperately strive to get one over the man who walked out on them - and an exceptionally hostile reception for the former coach from blue and gold fans when he returns to Pirtek Stadium later in the year," the website read.
Realising the sudden importance of Stuart returning to Parramatta, Eels CEO Scott Seward appealed to the NRL to draft Melbourne or New Zealand to Darwin instead.
"Melbourne was actually our No. 1 priority, because it's the Darwin attracts most of its tourists from Melbourne and we're trying to promote the Northern Territory," Seward said.
"We also had the Canberra and the Warriors in the mix, because they are cold climate teams and we wanted to stick them in the heat."
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But negotiations over the past week failed to entice a change of heart from League Central.
NRL operations boss Nathan McGuirk said Melbourne weren't an option because the 12-hour round trip to Darwin would have represented an unfair impost on the Storm's burdensome travel schedule.
"We've already got Melbourne playing a game in Perth (against the Bulldogs, Round Four), so it would not have been right to have them travel to Darwin as well, on top of all their other travel and Origin commitments," McGuirk said.
"The other consideration was that Canberra have not travelled to many of these destinations in the recent past."
The result has angered the seething sections of Eels fans who are still hurting over Stuart's decision to walk away after just one year in the job.
On internet chatrooms, some had boasted about already making banners branding Stuart a 'Judas'. Now they will have to save up for an airfare and accommodation, plus money for excess baggage to accommodate their messages of disdain.
"There's no doubt we would have loved to have Ricky back at Pirtek Stadium next year," Seward said.
"It's certainly a shame that couldn't be achieved and there's a vocal minority of fans who've given us feedback (yesterday).
"But we understand the process and overall are happy, because we got the weekend we wanted in Darwin and from a football perspective, it's advantageous playing a cold climate team up there."
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