An Albury youngster will play hooker for the first time in his career when he debuts in the NRL’s under 16 competition on Saturday.
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Aidan Connell will represent Canberra Raiders at home against South Sydney in the Harold Matthews Cup.
“I normally play lock, so playing hooker I’ll just need to play smarter, eyes up, always listening to my halves and observing what’s around me,” he said.
It’s been a gruelling pre-season for the Murray High School student.
“We started off with about 230 kids 14 weeks ago and we’re down to our last 25,” Raiders’ coach Bill Thomson said.
“You look at that picture there and Aidan’s done extremely well.”
Connell trained on Mondays at home, but then caught a bus from Wagga to the ACT on Fridays for training.
“Aidan’s a very talented individual who takes everything on board and puts it into practice,” Raiders’ satellite coach Trevour Slater said.
“He’s been training so hard on being the best he can and knowing how committed he is, I’m sure he’ll be ready to step up.”
And his coach is delighted with his progress.
“He’s got a lot of strengths, perseverance, hard-working, he’s dedicated and he’s versatile,” Thomson said.
“We needed someone with versatility in that position.
“Aidan has got a really good skill set, he’s got good feet, nice hands, he’s got a bit of vision and probably with his body shape and size, it will be a position suited to him moving forward.”
The 15-year old is strongly built at 80 kilograms.
The Border has had just the one player reach the NRL’s top level in current Albury Thunder coach Adrian Purtell, who joined the Raiders in 2003.
But Thomson is hoping there’s more in the future.
“In the last few years we’ve had more and more country boys coming into the squad,” he said.
“They’re a good fit, they’re very competitive and they’re nice and tough.”
The competition has a regular season of nine matches, followed by finals.