Not Only Is Jarryd Hayne Back In The NRL, But He’s Playing This Weekend

Look, if you’re a Parramatta Eels fan, there is one shining positive to come out of this morning’s bombshell announcement that beloved prodigal son Jarryd Hayne has signed with the Gold Coast Titans, and it’s this:
This is rock bottom. Absolute, pitch black, bottom of the well. In a year where everything that could’ve gone wrong did, this is it. The worst it’s gonna get. Hayne’s return to the club after a code-hopping sojourn that took in both the NFL and a brief flirtation with the Fiji Olympic Sevens squad was supposed to be an absolute layup. The literal easiest thing the club would do all year. They cleared the cap space when they unceremoniously dropped Kieran Foran. The doors (as loosely off their hinges as they may be) were open.
All the club had to do was table an offer.
But apparently “waiting until the end of the season” wasn’t good enough for Hayne, who not only signed a two-year deal with the Titans, but will make a remarkable return to the NRL when he takes the field for his new club this weekend.
Gold Coast coach Neil Henry confirmed that Hayne would suit up for the Titans in this weekend’s Round 22 clash against the New Zealand Warriors.
Henry flanked Hayne in a profoundly weird press conference, during which Hayne mentioned Parramatta a solid couple of dozen times, and appeared emotionally drained and perhaps unconvinced of even his own decision making.
When Hayne walked out of the Eels in 2014 to pursue a “lifelong dream” of playing pro-football in America, he did so with a “lifetime agreement” with both the club and fans that should he walk back into the NRL it would be in Eels blue and yellow and nothing else.
Even up until a few weeks ago, Hayne returning to the Eels seemed a mere formality: the board would sort out its tumultuous year upon the season’s end, and then a deal would be forwarded to Hayne in time for him to start preparing for Season 2017.
And yet remarkably, we’re now in a world where Hayne will have, in the space of twelve months, suited up and played professional-grade sport for the San Francisco 49ers, the Fijian National Sevens team, and now the Gold Coast Titans. If he keeps this pace up, he’ll be socking dingers for the Sydney Sixers by Christmas.
Hayne explained his decision in a Twitter post just prior to his thoroughly flat press conference, stating that it was Parramatta’s current disarray, as well as the offer that Gold Coast put on the table, that swayed him to take his talents to Southport Beach.

A man’s gotta get paid, I suppose.

Photo: Mark Kolbe/Getty.

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