{"id":729504,"date":"2026-06-11T11:14:19","date_gmt":"2026-06-11T11:14:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/729504\/"},"modified":"2026-06-11T11:14:19","modified_gmt":"2026-06-11T11:14:19","slug":"nrl-news-2026-jai-arrow-pre-game-tribute-for-rabbitohs-vs-broncos-video-medical-retirement-mnd-diagnosis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/729504\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL news 2026: Jai Arrow pre-game tribute for Rabbitohs vs Broncos, video; Medical retirement, MND diagnosis"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jai Arrow<\/a> has been honoured by two of his former clubs, South Sydney<\/a> and Brisbane<\/a>, in an emotional pre-game tribute on Thursday night.<\/p>\n

After announcing his medical retirement and motor neurone disease diagnosis<\/a> last month, the 30-year-old was a special guest at Accor Stadium.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Jai Arrow with his partner and daughter before the game\u00a0Nine<\/p>\n

Both teams wore special jerseys – the Rabbitohs in a fully white strip with his name on the back<\/a> and the Broncos also donning his name and number. <\/p>\n

The rival teams walked out together, led by captains Adam Reynolds<\/a> and Cody Walker<\/a>, who are both close mates of Arrow from their time together at Redfern.<\/p>\n

Players from both teams then lined up in a guard of honour before Arrow walked out alongside his partner Berina and young daughter Ayla.<\/p>\n

Arrow had tears in his eyes, clearly overcome with emotion, as he made his way out before ringing the Rabbitohs\u2019 legacy bell.<\/p>\n

\u201cHardly a dry eye in the house,\u201d Peter Psaltis said on Nine. <\/p>\n

He then posed for a photo with both Reynolds and Walker before kick off.<\/p>\n

Prior to the ceremony, Arrow spoke to Nine\u2019s Danika Mason about the outpouring of support, not only from those two teams but the wider NRL community.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very surreal,\u201d the former Maroons star said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI never anticipated any of this and truly, from the bottom of my heart, this means the world to me. I didn\u2019t think that many people liked me.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just very grateful for my family and everyone that\u2019s been a part of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is what it is. I\u2019ve got a fight on my hands and I will fight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Arrow played 178 first grade games for the Broncos, Titans and Rabbitohs, as well as making 12 appearances at State of Origin level for Queensland.<\/p>\n

Earlier this week, Arrow tossed the coin at the AFL Big Freeze game<\/a>, which has been a yearly tribute to Neale Daniher<\/a>, who died after a lengthy MND battle.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Jai Arrow tosses the coin at the MCG.\u00a0AFL Photos via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Souths opened the scoring through Edward Kosi before try-scoring legend Alex Johnston made it a 12-0 lead for the hosts mid-way through the first half.<\/p>\n

David Fifita extended the margin before Johnston bagged his double, with the Broncos left searching for answers and staring down six-straight losses.<\/p>\n

Jamie Humphreys completed a stunning first-half onslaught as the cardinal and myrtle went into the sheds with a 30-0 buffer.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are embarrassing at the moment the Broncos,\u201d Brad Fittler said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jai Arrow has been honoured by two of his former clubs, South Sydney and Brisbane, in an emotional…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":729505,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-729504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729504","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=729504"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/729504\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/729505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=729504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=729504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=729504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}