The Sterling routine gets a generous response: another win. And he has enjoyed himself. Earlier in the day, he had traversed the 18 holes of Kooralbyn's golf course. Tomorrow he'll go to the races before cranking out another speech at Jupiter's Casino, then back up for another golf date at nearby Royal Pines on Sunday. Not a bad weekend, he reckons - and all expenses paid.

The irony of these few days says much about the man. Football and fun make up the game that is Peter Sterling's life. He admits that it's all just been one big ball, and for years it was to hell with anything that might have stood in the way of that lifestyle. He works bloody hard at his football, has been a model to his peers, and the rewards have followed. Yet he has enjoyed every moment, giving his blood and guts to something he loves to death anyway.

Inside Sport magazine, April 1992.

Perhaps the one factor that distinguishes a real champion is performance under pressure. Sterling handles that pressure weekly in a Parramatta outfit in which, as the side's natural playmaker at halfback, he attracts formidable attention from defences. He is the nearest thing to rugby league's version of the American football quarterback, with his calling of the shots and ability to read a game from the middle as well as most coaches sitting high in the stands - not to mention his slick passing, precise tactical kicking and tremendous workload in defence. Opposing coaches put it simply: "Stop Sterling and you stop Parramatta." Yet in 14 years of watching him play, I have never seen him bow to that pressure. Judges of players have also given him a matchless stamp of approval. There's the Golden Boot (the award for the world's best player), two Rothman's Medals and two Dally M awards. And all attained while Parramatta, champions of the early ‘80s, were struggling.

Long before the term "professional footballer" came into vogue, Sterlo wanted nothing else. Footy, and running the school SP bookmaking business, interrupted his studies. Since dropping out of Teachers' College, jobs have been brief interruptions to rugby league, golf, tennis and the racecourse. He has revelled in being the likeable larrikin who rose late in the day and planned nothing past the time when he would hit the sack again. And here he was on the Gold Coast lecturing the nine-to-five business types he had never aspired to join.