Jai Arrow's last NRL game was the second of a lifetime

The record books will show that Jai Arrow’s last game as a South Sydney Rabbitoh lasted exactly one second.

It was one second not for a career, but for a footballing life as rugby league gave him everything it could, which was everything it had.

This was one second that really mattered in a way a century of Rabbitohs-Roosters matches never could. Their hatred, which flared up later on, felt insignificant.

Normally the NRL defines and destroys itself according to such bitterness but for one second it felt so easy to stow away that pettiness. Never has so much been fit into that second.

There was room for Arrow to run onto the field, to wave to his wife Berina and his daughter Ayla Rae in scenes that summoned an emotion deeper than description can provide.

There was room for former Rabbitoh brothers-in-arms to line the tunnel to cheer him on, lustily and loud, just how he would have wanted it.

Some of them are still playing in the NRL now. Was it really just a year ago they last met Arrow under the bright lights?

His last two weeks are Arrow’s bravest as he’s brought up his 99th and 100th game for South Sydney following his motor neurone disease (MND) diagnosis, but his final full season was certainly his toughest.

He carried a series of injuries through a rotten Bunnies campaign to earn a place of high honour in winning the club’s player of the year award, leading from the front in many a footballing battle that was lost long before kick-off.

Some of those who lined the tunnel left such fights behind many seasons ago, former teammates and greybeards alike, but they shared a desire to return to give their mate a send off nobody could have ever imagined he'd ever need.

All of them were there when it mattered to slap his back, to shout his name, to make him feel like the player he has always been and was again one last time.

There was room for Arrow to walk on with hope in his heart and perhaps, just for a second, to hear the sweet, silver song of a lark as the emotion fell down upon him.

There was room for a moment with Cody Walker, who just last week Arrow begged to spray him as he left the field against Gold Coast so things could feel like they used to be.

The brotherhood between the two men was palpable and their embrace was proof deeds are truer than words and that while it’s easy to tell somebody you love them it’s more important, if you can, to try and show them.

There was room for an embrace with Wayne Bennett, who has done so much for so many men in his half century of coaching but has never had to grapple with something like this.

Last week he helped Arrow put his boots on. This week he just held him.

Arrow’s face had been fighting the tears since the moment he hit the lights of the stadium and they welled up when he met Walker but only when he found Bennett’s arms did they flow, nakedly and unashamed, before his coach held his hand and led him to his family.

He sat on the bench for the final 79 minutes and 58 seconds, wrapped in a coat and chatting to Souths players about nothing and everything as he became a footballer for one more second, a second the game will carry forever.

Sport often drifts towards self-importance but this is a case where it can be actually important.

For proof of that rest assured that result of the match, which the Rabbitohs won 50-20, did not mean all that much.

It was a fine enough way to spend a Friday evening. A lot of things happened therein, from tries to bizarre refereeing calls to a face off between Keaon Koloamatangi and Spencer Leniu that Arrow would have loved, especially since South Sydney got the better of it.

None of it mattered as much as the first second, a second that had to happen now if it was to happen at all.

Arrow’s degeneration since his public revelation of his diagnosis in May is already plain to see, even as there is no doubt he will continue on as bravely as a person can.

There is no known cure for motor neurone disease. Even with the assurance that anything that can be done for Arrow will be done, the hardest of days loom.

But on Friday night, there was still some time.

Time for an ancient rivalry to seem small as it was postponed for something that really mattered.

Time for men, some of whom might not know their emotions all that well, to embrace as brothers and bear their hearts to one another, bleeding and raw and full.

Time to feel the love and to show it, to share the things we too often do not say.

Time for the sport that has been such a part of Arrow’s life to give him the greatest gift it could muster, all wrapped up in just one second.