You can buy the book - in paperback - HERE from the Rabbitohs site - Afterword transcription thanks to Penny

AFTERWORD -- BY RUSSELL CROWE

I had to plough through a sea of people one day to meet Mark Courtney. Finally, I got to him. I'm not sure if I said thank you straight away, or if I waited 4 or 5 seconds.

I think it was Andrew Denton who gave me a copy of "Moving the Goalposts". I carried it around with me for a while, travelling here and there, finally I had the time so I sat down to read it. The hours drifted away and whatever else I was supposed to do that day lost out to Mark's compelling book. There were experiences in that book that mirrored my own, little gems of memory stimulated and things that came back to me that I'd almost forgotten, so I spent the day in the warm hubris of my childhood, and you have to thank anyone who can do that for you.

It was Andrew Denton, again, who suggested I offer Mark some creative post in the new regime after Peter Holmes a Court and I had taken over the football club, the phrase he used was poet laureate. I had a bigger job in mind, and if my instinct was correct, Mark Courtney was the right man at the right time.

I had been in quite a privileged position with Souths for many years, between 1994 and 2006, got to see the workings of many different coaches, felt the fear in our dressing room way too may times. I could never quite understand why the players and staff created that discomfort, why they didn't in the simplest of senses "think positive". There are a million answers for this, ones we all know, budgets, etc, but I'm just a fan, and I see things in a sharper light. I want to win and I want to speak the language of winning and I don't want any bullshit excuses. Occasionally I would get to say that to the players, occasionally they would just drop all the doom and gloom and step out to play, one 20-0 win over Penrith at Penrith comes to mind, a 41-14 demolishing of Melbourne is another, with Shane Walker wearing the Mexican bandit moustache!!

At some point it dawned on me that we had successive season after season of players come and go but nobody was in place to educate them about the club they were playing for. That is definitely a sign of a perennial losing culture, we were so far gone, nobody even bothered to talk to the new players of their club's glorious history.

In a circle of first graders, at a social occasion a season or two after re-admittance I asked if anybody knew how many premierships Souths had won... no answers... Who had won the most premierships then? I got a multitude of answers. St. George, Easts, Manly... Brisbane, said one genius!!!

When I said it was Souths I got a whole lot of incredulous stares and one asked: "True?"

Yes. True.

When Peter and I took over we had a long list of things that needed to stop, change, or be reshaped. Creating the platform to educate the players in the long and glorious history of Souths was on that list, the result of that need in the public form is this: The Book of Feuds.

My instincts about Mark Courtney have held true, a tireless worker, a great soldier, regular sparks of brilliance, always there, the Gary Stevens of literature.

Ultimately The Book of Feuds is a type of prayer book for the fans, but also a new tradition for the players, a weekly reading and discussion about our past and our future and the challenge before the team that week. The full reality of what the players and the coach discuss week to week will probably never be made public, but as a fan, I hope that this book influences informed debate and brings back memories for anyone who reads, and helps focus the energy of all of us who love our great club.

We all know now that history was made in 2007, an 18 year drought was broken, we made the finals. So many people, players, coaches, fans, sponsors contributed to that history making effort, but at its essence what we have begun to do as a club, is remember who we are and stand up for our past achievements and great players, our colours and our future.

Runocious. (run faster)
Servo Prosapia. (protect the family)
Liberi Primoris. (children first)

Russell Crowe