Rugby league players are conditioned to focus on the next task.
The next tackle. The next hit-up. The next training session. The next opponent.
Weeks like this are no different for Blues captain Isaah Yeo as he prepares to lead NSW into battle against Queensland at the MCG in front of almost 90,000 fans on Wednesday evening.
But, for a fleeting moment, and for everything he has achieved in the game, Yeo allows himself to reflect on the prospect of a hard-working and skinny kid from Dubbo becoming a State of Origin-winning captain.
“A young Isaah just wouldn’t believe it,” he says. “Every journey is different, but I wasn’t the most talented. I just felt the harder I worked, the luckier I got.”
Yeo has won premierships with Penrith and represented Australia, but helping orchestrate another Blues win and a 2-0 series lead as captain would go close to trumping everything he has done in a sport he fell in love with through his father, Justin, an 11-game first-grader for North Sydney and Balmain.
Blues players will board a team bus at 6pm on Wednesday from their hotel to the MCG and it will take between 10 and 25 minutes, depending on traffic.
Of all things to reminisce about, Yeo brings up the six-hour bus rides he took as a schoolboy from Dubbo to the big smoke, determined to do anything to get his breakthrough.
“In year 12, I didn’t do the first term back at home because I had a pre-season in Penrith’s SG ball side,” he says.
“When the season started, I’d catch a bus and a train from Dubbo to Penrith, do a captain’s run, play on the Saturday, and then get a train home at about 6am on the Sunday morning.
“I did that for about 12 weeks. It didn’t really help my ATAR or my HSC that much and I don’t know whether Mum and Dad liked that I was away from school, but it didn’t feel like a sacrifice at the time because I was doing what I loved.”
The Origin dream burnt bright for Yeo early, like many budding footballers in the region.
He recalls fellow Dubbo product Andrew Ryan making a pit stop in his home town with Blues teammates about two decades ago.
“Being from the bush and having an Origin squad come out, you’re just going, ‘This is the best thing ever’,” Yeo says. “You certainly try and put yourself in those shoes now.
“You’ve just got to be a good person. If it’s signatures or a meet and greet, it’s just making sure you’re all in on that. I certainly remember things when I was a kid.”
Yeo is acutely aware of the responsibility that comes with captaining the Blues but knows that, while club loyalties will remain, there is nothing like NSW fans willing their team on. They will rally, like always, behind their ultra-consistent skipper whose bad games you could count on one hand.
This will be Yeo’s fifth match as Blues captain and 19th game in the Origin arena. He has a 2-2 record as skipper, including last year’s shattering 24-12 home loss in the decider in Sydney.
Jake Trbojevic (2024), James Tedesco (2021) and Boyd Cordner (2018 and 2019) are the most recent Blues skippers to win Origin series.
The pressure of Origin II will be intense, but it is not something that bothers the unflappable 31-year-old.
“You’d be lying though if you said it [the pressure] wasn’t different in Origin,” Yeo says. “Ultimately, you’re doing what you love. All you want to do as a child is play NRL and then hopefully go and be a part of Origin. I certainly don’t take it for granted.
“Certainly as I’ve got older, you get confidence out of your preparation, so it’s making sure you don’t really deviate or change what you do normally just because it’s a bigger game. I’m just trying to be myself and that’s all I’ve ever done with my leadership style.
“I’ve been lucky enough to be part of some big games and you learn on the run.”
Yeo says the nerves of big games have become easier to handle. Four straight premierships with Penrith from 2021 to 2024 helped that, as has the familiarity of being alongside a handful of current and former Panthers teammates. Casey McLean was supposed to be there but was ruled out with a quad injury on Saturday.
“Everyone’s made sacrifices because we wouldn’t be in this position without them,” Yeo says. “I’ve been very lucky with the family I’ve got around me and my old man played a bit of NRL. He was only 18 when he had me, so I was always able to be at his footy.
“I feel it’s always a bit harder coming from the country and the opportunities now I think are better than what they were when I was coming through. I was probably the first wave coming through, particularly at Penrith, where they were trying to get pathways sorted out in that region.”
Yeo knows the narrative can swing so quickly in Origin. Dropped balls and a misfiring attack left the Blues open to criticism in game one before Kalyn Ponga’s errant shoulder on Tolu Koula swung momentum and helped NSW snatch a thrilling win.
A Blues victory in Melbourne and Brisbane would be hailed as Origin dominance. A NSW series loss, having been 1-0 up, and the chokers tag will be theirs to wear.
“It’s just the highest of highs or the lowest of lows,” Yeo says. “If you lose a grand final, there’s no lower feeling. If you lose a decider in Origin, there’s no lower feeling. What makes those environments special is riding the rollercoaster.”
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Tom Decent is the chief sports writer for The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via X or email.
