Making the Team by Scott Prince Read Free Book Online

My body crashes to the ground. With my arm outstretched, I ground the ball on the white paint of the try-line five metres from the sideline.
    The ref blows his whistle. The crowd goes ape! I have scored! Team mates rush in and jump on top of me.
    But the game isn’t finished yet.
    The score is now sixteen-all. The crowd are on the edge of their seats as they watch Prince line up his goal kick. He needs to kick it to win the game. If he misses it we go into golden-point extra time. But by the look of the Broncos players, they’ve had enough.
    The conversion isn’t an easy one. He must be deadly accurate. Prince looks towards the sky and then back to the goal posts. The crowd goes silent, except for the Panthers supporters. They do everything they can to distract him. He places the ball on the kicking tee and lines it up. I watch him walk in towards the ball as he gracefully strikes it in the direction of the posts. Both teams watch it as it spirals through the air. The people down the other end of the stadium stretch their necks to see if the ball is on target. It goes straight through the uprights! The touch judges raise their flags. Broncos win eighteen points to sixteen!
    The stadium erupts! Kids are waving their flags andstrangers are hugging each other in the stands. It’s only a trial match, but the crowd knows they’ve seen an amazing game of football tonight. They’re excited about the upcoming season, and so am I.

Chapter 30
    Breakfast
    Mum is at the table eating breakfast and reading the newspaper. Mongrel the cat is hungry and annoying her as usual. She’s looking at the photos of the game, trying to spot me being a ball boy. My body is sore from last night’s game, but I can’t let Mum know I’m hurting.
    â€œYou got home late last night,” says Mum, looking up from the paper.
    â€œYeah,” I say. “The club wanted us to stay back and pump up the balls.” I hate fibbing to Mum, but I haven’t worked out how to tell her the truth.
    â€œAre you and Justice the world’s best ball boys yet?” she smiles, taking a bite of her toast. I grab the nearest box of cereal and pour it in a bowl.
    â€œNo, but I got a bit of time on the field. I think they want us for the next game as well,” I say, pouring some milk.
    â€œGood for you, son!” Mum smiles. She finishes reading the paper and gets up to tidy the kitchen. I reach for the sports pages. I’m glad she hasn’t read these. One of the headlines says, “Who Is Deadly D?” There’s a picture of me that nearly fills the entire back page! In the photo, I am crashing into some Panthers players. The article says kids everywhere are calling Deadly D a hero. It also says that in some country towns, after the game, kids ran outside and started playing footy. They all wanted to be just like Deadly D! Maybe Justice is right. Maybe the curse is a gift. It looks like coming to Brisbane wasn’t such a bad idea after all.
    I grip my spoon and dig it into my cereal. I’m starving. Playing in the NRL gives you an appetite. As I put the spoon to my mouth, I see Mum at the sink, giving me a weird look.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œYou gonna eat that?” she asks.
    â€œYeah, why?” I say.
    â€œThose cornflakes you’re about to eat …” she says. “What about them?”
    â€œThey aren’t cornflakes, they’re cat food,” she laughs.

Chapter 31
    An Interesting Conversation
    It’s lunchtime. Mr Woolly’s window is above the handball courts. The noise from his office hits the brick wall opposite his window and travels downwards. Sometimes you can hear him telling his wife how much he loves her. Well, I think it’s his wife. It’s the kind of stuff you don’t want to hear, but you can’t help it. The only way to ignore it is to keep playing handball.
    The other day Mr Woolly had a conversation that was worth stopping