That is as good a try as you'll ever see.

Rex Mossop called it.

Canterbury winger Steve Gearin scored it.

And Bulldogs coach Ted Glossop celebrated it.

But Wagga's Greg Brentnall set it up. A break, a left-foot bomb, and bang! One of rugby league's great grand final moments was born and the 1980 premiership sealed against Eastern Suburbs Roosters.

"It was great. It was amazing because, although there was eight or nine minutes to go, we knew we were home," Brentnall says.

"We were very confident going into the game but we had a bit of a battle and when we scored that try (we knew).

"Canterbury hadn't won a comp for 38 years. So it was pretty special."

Greg Brentnall was a great player in a great era at Canterbury, and was the club's first Rothmans Medallist in 1982.

He'd missed their 1979 grand final loss to St George after breaking his arm in the preliminary final. And injury cut short his career at the end of 1983 (a knee then, but both arms had been broken prior, and cheekbones fractured).

Brentnall was finished by the time Warren Ryan arrived and turned Canterbury into the Dogs of War, with back-to-back premierships in 1984 and 1985.

But he was part of one of Canterbury's most flamboyant and likable teams, a close-knit crew known as 'The Entertainers'.

And 1980 was his breakout year.

A full season, state and international representation, and a famous premiership with 'the family club', alongside three mates from Wagga, Steve, Peter and Chris Mortimer, as well as three Hughes brothers.

"It was an enormous time, particularly to have two sets of three brothers in the team, and myself, I'd grown up with the Mortimers," Brentnall recalls.

He has no hesitation in naming the best player of his era.

"Steve Mort was always my favourite. I played with him as a kid and some of the things he could do were just amazing. Until I saw Billy Slater's highlights tape, Steve had by far the best.

"Particularly at Canterbury where we played in an era where Ted Glossop encouraged us to use the footy, and we had four or five guys who had come through as ball-players.

"Some of the tries we scored, but in particular some of the chip-and-chases that Steve did... and he was doing that at 15, 16 as well when we were playing at Turvey Park.

"I'm a bit biased, but he's always been my favourite."

Brentnall had represented NSW twice in 1980, and then played for Australia in New Zealand. That was the first of 13 games in the green and gold, including the famous 1982 Invincibles tour of Great Britain, under Frank Stanton.

But it was after playing for Australia in 1980 that he was picked for a new concept: a State of Origin exhibition game between NSW and Queensland, with players representing where they were from, not the league they were playing in.

At the time, it seemed little more than a gimmick, and a chance for a mid-season trip away.

"The comp was based in Sydney. Our biggest trip was up the freeway to Penrith. And this was two nights in Brisbane, all expenses paid," he says.

It wasn't long after landing in Brisbane that the NSW players soon realised there was more to it north of the border.

"I still remember (captain) Tommy Raudonikis went out for a walk on the day of the game and he came back and he said, 'There's something happening here.' And when we arrived at the old Lang Park, we had to walk through the main bar to get to the dressing rooms," Brentnall chuckles and shakes his head.

"There were people everywhere. They'd been on the drink all day. They were pulling our bags. Growling at us! We said, 'We've just come for an exhibition game!'"

Famously, Queensland won, led by Arthur Beetson who was picked out of reserve grade. Brentnall doesn't know whether Origin would have lasted had NSW won. But it did more than last.

"It was the saviour of the game at the time," Brentnall says.

"When we were moving back to Wagga, I pulled out the receipt. It was $75 we got paid for the first Origin. They now get $30,000, and it generates something like $100 million.

"The money it's generated has kept the game alive."

Keeping the game alive is something Greg Brentnall has long been passionate about.

After retiring, he returned to Wagga in 1984 and spent the best part of a dozen years as a rugby league development officer, employed by the Country Rugby League, but appointed by NSWRL supremo John Quayle.

"I was one-out across the whole southern part of the state, from Hay in the west across to Canberra, Goulburn, and through to the south coast. There was no-one else," he says.

With fond memories of a good local support network, including Bruce Barrett, Barry Cottam, and Peter Rands, Brentnall is proud of the player development and coach education and accreditation programs they ran.

Three decades later, the Raiders are playing competition games in Wagga.

"It's amazing. That they can bring a club game here is enormous," Brentnall says.

"But it's probably just going back to what should've happened 30 years ago."

Back then, there was no job description and the responsibilities were as wide as the area he covered.

But Brentnall notes that at the same time, AFL was in the same position. In fact, his old Turvey Park Aussie rules teammate, Mick Daniher, was the lone ranger for that sport.

In 1996, Super League hit. That meant a short-term boon: Brentnall was employed by the Canberra Raiders and given two more full-time staff. And the CRL replaced him in the region as well.

But in the long term, rugby league's civil war cost it dearly.

Brentnall estimates now that the AFL employs three times as many staff as rugby league across southern NSW and he laments the fact that not enough money finds its way to growing the game at the junior level.

"We haven't got the resources the AFL have got either. We got the big television dollars ($1.8 billion) three years ago. But there wasn't a lot of it that went into the grassroots of the game in particular," he says.

"We haven't had a war chest. The AFL have got a war chest. Our war chest went on Super League, unfortunately. That's where we lost a lot of momentum."

Brentnall has spent most of his post-playing days focussed on rugby league coaching and development.

Two decades in Melbourne gave him a unique insight - into growing a game in 'enemy territory' and into the culture and qualities required to create one of Australian sport's most highly-regarded clubs.

He went as an assistant to Melbourne's foundation coach, his old Canterbury teammate, Chris Anderson.

Later, Brentnall moved into the football manager's role and then was general manager of Melbourne Storm Development, an initiative supported by Victorian government funding to build rugby league.

"In 2006, the state had 600 juniors but they've now got 5000 playing," he says.

"There were some great lessons there. We got no direct (free to air) TV coverage until 2011... so trying to build the game, build a membership and get young kids to play the game was really hard."

State of Origin in Melbourne in 2006 was enormous, and international fixtures to follow all helped create exposure and generate funds to go into development.

And the Storm's success and incredible consistency under coach Craig Bellamy didn't hurt rugby league's brand either.

"Craig came in a time when we had pretty good foundations but what he's done has been amazing. I think particularly the work ethic and attention to detail that he brings," Brentnall says.

His son Marc is now an assistant to Bellamy. Brentnall also gives football manager Frank Ponissi great credit ("he's the best in the game at what he does") for allowing the super coach to concentrate on what he's good at.

"Craig can concentrate on week-to-week, improving every player and every staff member in his footy department," he says.

"And not just every week but every day that they go out on the training paddock, they've got that ethic there. Because Craig's the first one there, the last one to leave. And if they're not toe-ing the line, someone's pulling them into line."

Then there's the greatest player he's seen, Storm captain Cameron Smith.

When Brentnall thinks back to Smith's arrival, before his debut in 2002, he couldn't imagine he would go on to play more than 500 top-flight games of football.

"I look at Smithy when he first came in... and no way," Brentnall says.

"He's not an athlete. He's not the quickest bloke in Australia. Not strong in the gym. But he's the best I've ever seen. Just the influence he has on the game.

"He's just an amazing fella. I look at him all the time. I've seen quite a few of those 400 games that he's played at NRL level, and the Test matches and Origins - he's played another 100 in representative footy - and I've never seen him dominated.

"Whether he's defending or whether he's carrying the footy, I've never seen him dominated by anybody. He's obviously got great balance and great body awareness.

"He's just made for footy. He's something special."

Brentnall has been back in his home town for a couple of years. He believes the NSWRL move to take over the CRL and form one body was a step in the right direction but says more needs to be done.

Any concerns are borne out of a love for the game he's lived.

"The game, I don't think it's ever been better. I love watching the games. Some of the tries and the skill level of the players at the top level is great," he says.

"But I wonder, particularly when I look at participation rates, whether we're still going to be able to generate that level in the future."

To that end, he's been involved in developing rugby league's Player Development Framework. He firmly believes the philosophy to ensure a bright future has to be built on fun.

"We should be focussing more on 'deliberate play' rather than specialist coaching sessions for 12 and 13 year olds, or picking a young kid to be a left centre at 10 or 11," he says.

"Playing games and enjoying what they're doing at training. Games that are using and developing their skills and learning to play what's in front of them rather than training for it with set plays."

The framework is controversial to some for its focus on reducing competitiveness in young age groups. But Brentnall says the game's future will ride on its ability to make sure players enjoy themselves.

He is also a big believer in a broad sporting education.

"There's a pushback against 'specialisation' (at a young age)," he says.

"That was the great thing about growing up in the country - I got the opportunity to play rugby league and AFL. If I wanted to play soccer, I could've. I played tennis. I swam.

"I had the opportunity to do a lot of things that kids in the city centres don't. And they tend to specialise a lot earlier rather than get that overall diversification of sports."

For the same reasons, he considers it more important for players to have regional pathways and incentives to keep them at home.

"I think it's important to have a philosophy where you keep the kids engaged to stay in their home environment for as long as they can. Not having 15 or 16 year old kids going down to Sydney to play in an under 16 competition, living in the middle of Sydney, travelling an hour to train, under the misapprehension that they're going to make it and be a Cameron Smith in three or four years time."

Brentnall is at pains to point out that not everything should be underlined by pathways and high performance.

Of at least as much importance is a sport with strong links to the community, and strong club cultures.

"Without being able to put it into one thing, the Player Development Framework is about a positive experience of the game at an early age, which basically generates engagement for life," he says.

"A positive experience isn't necessarily about playing NRL.

"It's refereeing, coaching, being an official, being involved in Men of League. It's an engagement with the game itself.

"I think getting kids involved in country footy is important for the community and to grow stable young people."