Around the multi-million dollar Heffron Park home of the Rabbitohs, Wayne Bennett will wander past his players and casually put a call out for “the big fella”.
It’s at this point you’d probably think Latrell Mitchell or maybe Keaon Koloamatangi or even Campbell Graham are likely to answer.
Who the old coach really wants is Jye Gray. He’s 170cm. That might even be helped by his impressive bouffant.
“He walks around calling me that,” Gray laughs. “He’s a good guy and he looks after all of us.”
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It won’t show up on too many end-of-season highlight reels, but in the space of 15 seconds a couple of weeks ago, Gray showed why Bennett is particularly looking after his little No.1, the best pound-for-pound player in the NRL this year.
As Dylan Brown surged through the Rabbitohs’ defensive line and shovelled a ball back inside to Eels fullback Isiah Iongi, a blur of white headgear turned in a flash and then hurtled head first into the legs of Iongi, who was Winx-like odds to score. Gray made the try-saving tackle. There haven’t been many more times this year where The Burrow has cheered louder.
As the South Sydney defensive line desperately retreated for the next play, Gray got up and then threw his body in front of Dylan Walker, and helped deny another gilt-edged chance. It even brought a smile to the old coach’s face.
“He’s captured everyone’s imagination,” Bennett tells foxsports.com.au.
“Here’s this little guy in stature, and he just plays his heart out. He’s fun to watch. He’s making great tackles and saving tries, he’s making great runs and scoring tries.
“He’s just full of energy.”
Jye Gray has ‘captured everyone’s imagination’, says Wayne Bennett.Source: Getty ImagesTeammates love him too: Souths’ Jack Wighton and Jye Gray.Source: Getty Images
Of all the weird and wild storylines which have dominated the NRL this season, there perhaps hasn’t been one as wholesome as that of Gray, the smallest player in the game who led the Dally M count early in the season.
There’s something magnetic about a little man in rugby league, doing things they shouldn’t in the toughest body contact sport in the world.
Barry “Bunny” Reilly was perhaps the most famous, upending his much bigger rivals with glee for the Roosters in the 1960s and 1970s. He was 163cm. In the modern era, Allan Langer stood at just 165cm. Preston Campbell, 167cm. Gray is about the only current player who could moonlight in the Reggie The Rabbit suit.
But the game is also different now, its athletes full-time professionals, and its scouts thinking they only need to look at a physique to know if someone is going to make it or not.
It was about the time when Gray was 18 that his manager, former Queensland fullback Clinton Schifcofske, had to sit down with the Gold Coast teenager and his dad, Shayne, and tell him what recruiters thought. All of Gray’s peers were being snapped up by NRL clubs around the country. He still didn’t have a bite, let alone a contract.
“Everyone has got a knock on you and they just think you’re too small,” Schifcofske bluntly told them. “But I don’t.”
He’d come prepared.
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Alfie stands at just 165cm, five cms shorter than Gray.Source: News Corp Australia
Schifcofske asked Gray if he had heard of Langer. Given he wasn’t even born when Langer made his famous State of Origin return under Bennett in the 2001 series, it’s not a wild theory to suspect Gray wouldn’t know much about him.
“Yeah, I do,” Gray said. “He was a real good halfback for Queensland and dad talks about him all the time.”
“One of the greatest halfbacks to ever play the game,” Schifcofske nodded. “How tall do you reckon he was?”
“I don’t know,” Gray said.
“Well, you’re taller than the greatest halfback Queensland has ever had, so you can make it if you want to,” Schifcofske told him.
Something clicked with Gray.
“I like that.”
But Gray still needed someone to take a chance on him.
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It was then that former Rabbitohs NSW Cup and assistant NRL coach Joe O’Callaghan was given the task to go and find the best five-eighth in the country. He came back to the club with a recommendation about Gray, a schoolboy phenomenon on the Gold Coast who was also lighting up touch footy fields around the state.
O’Callaghan and Rabbitohs stalwart Mark Ellison flew up to speak to Gray and offered him a full-time gig in Sydney once he finished Year 12 at The Southport School, while the Broncos were only content to keep him as part of their academy.
Sydney wasn’t completely foreign to him. He spent the first 18 months of his life in the harbour city before his family moved across the Tweed, and he now resides with an uncle and aunty who live close to Maroubra.
Asked if deep down he was ever worried about Gray’s height, Schifcofske says: “I never did, but everyone else did.
“They would poke me a bit and say, ‘you’re dreaming, he will never play first grade’.
Height’s an issue, but if they’re tough enough and brave enough, it’s not. He might get bumped off here and there, but we’ve got halves in the NRL who won’t get in front of blokes. He will. He will stick his head where he shouldn’t.
“And with the way the modern game is going now – and I knew with the rule changes – it suits your Jye Grays, Sam Walkers, Keano Kinis, Ryan Papenhuyzens. The ball is in play that much the big boys can’t keep up.”
Jye Gray celebrates with teammates after the Round 24 win over the Eels.Source: Getty Images
Schifcofske is right.
Once the domain of the biggest and strongest, the NRL has never been a better playground for the little man. Forward packs are becoming smaller and more mobile. Coaches lust over greater speed in their outside backs. They want halves who can direct, create, kick, tackle … and more than ever, run.
Gray, 21, might have found the NRL sweet spot – even if most thought it would never happen.
He’d only just debuted in the NRL when his South Sydney coach, Jason Demetriou, was sacked. Demetriou had told him he’d always admired Kodi Nikorima’s ability to belie his pint-sized frame, and thought Gray could do the same. Demetriou started Gray at fullback, even though he’d barely played the position until joining the Rabbitohs.
“I enjoy proving people wrong,” Gray says. “It’s something I do get motivation from, but it’s not the end of the world when I hear someone say I’m too small.
“I don’t think other peoples’ opinions matter when they want to put you down. It’s the way it is these days. Some people don’t like you; some people do. But I’ve got so many people that support me in what I do.
“I’m lucky I was born pretty quick. They got rid of my height so they gave me speed.”
‘It’s not the end of the world when I hear someone say I’m too small’Source: News Corp Australia
Gray’s not just your average footballer, in more ways than one. He was a diligent student at school, achieving an ATAR of 93, and being named on the Dean’s list. His friends had wide and varied interests, from those on the academic teams to rugby teammates.
“It didn’t matter whether we were playing a warm up game of touch, a fun game of tunnel ball in PE or an inter-class basketball shootout, he just hated losing,” The Southport School rugby director Adrian Blundell says. “I don’t think I saw him lose.
“In his final year, he not only got our player of the year, but one of the most coveted trophies at TSS is the best defender in the school – and he was awarded that in his final year from fullback.
“I agree with Wayne, it’s got nothing to do with his size. Look at his bravery and effectiveness in those one-on-one tackles.”
On Friday night, Gray will lock horns with Roosters veteran James Tedesco, the overwhelming favourite to win the Dally M Medal later this month, trying to torpedo the tricolours’ finals hopes at the death. Nothing would bring more glee to their bitter rivals.
There is a chance Tedesco will be bearing down on the little South Sydney No.1 at some stage, with that pinball-like tendency, powerful hips and ability to break tackles like no other. Gray won’t take a backward step.
“I’ve never been tall,” Gray says. “I feel like I’ve just got to go out there and give everything I’ve got.”
Which is good enough for the old coach, who likes “the big fella” just the way he is.