Matt Ikuvalu - Interesting Read

[RoosterJ]

Interesting read of a very humble bloke. Good to see him succeed!

[stephenj]

this young man is certainly the type of person we want in our club epiomises the no dickhead policy we want id be delighted if through injury he came ib to our side in the centres or wing! love to see him score the grand final winning try!

[The Skeez]

Another reason to hate the video ref, even the players hate it.

“I was so happy when I scored my first try, three games later against the Melbourne Storm – but I was trying to hold it in! I was trying to be humble, just smile a bit, just in case it wasn’t awarded. It went to the video ref and I was thinking, ‘If I don’t score this, I don’t want to have looked too happy’.
I held back everything, but inside I was about to explode. When you score, you don’t know whether to celebrate or not now, with the video reviews after most tries.
But I scored it. An NRL try. They can never take that away from me.”

[SupermanSupportsEasts4Eva]

Seems like a good kid. Glad to see he has his head screwed on

[RoosterJ]

yeah my favorite bit is:

"Robbo came up to me on the Monday after that, the week of Round 13.

He said to me, ‘Are you ready?’

I said, ‘Yeah’.

Robbo said, ‘Yeah, I know you’re ready’.

I was pretty humbled by that.

Robbo is a great bloke. He’s very approachable. I remember I was a bit scared and nervous when I first met him, but he’s the kind of bloke who makes an effort to say hi and have a chat to all his players, ask them how they are. He’ll always be the guy who made me an NRL player."

[Johnny Brass]

He got better with every game in first grade and in those couple of wyong roos games that were on channel 9 I thought he was our best player . He runs it back hard and got plenty of go in him, I think his a first grader.

[007]

An excellent replacement for Fergo. Would be great to have them both but not to be unfortunately.

I can see Ikuvalu and Manu doing some seriously good things on the right hand side for years to come.

[Tommy Smith]

Great article. Great young bloke.

Is he injured atm? I'm suprised to see him behind Momirovski in the pecking order.

[Cockadoodledoo]

After his first game, I honestly wasn't sure he would get another one, however he improved as each game went. With Hall injured, I think he will prove more than adequate depth cover and I wouldn't write him off making a career at NRL level, if not at the Roosters, then somewhere else.

[ism22]

Must be tough being like him or (for example) Vunacece. Both are gun players who have done so well to get to this stage where they are oh so close but not quite good enough for the NRL.

Good news is that he has a backup plan. IMO if he teaches and plays reserve grade on the weekend he could do alright! Dunno what he earns but say teaching pays ~$75k and footy gives him $50k+ to play reserve-grade... he could do alright!

A friend is not quite good enough for the A-League (reuters any of the feeders) in soccer and is about 35. he gets something like $350 a week + petrol money to train twice a week and play on weekends. He teaches casually and the soccer is a nice top-up for his salary. Getting paid to play reserve-grade ain't bad!

Another friend (who was in a topless NRL calendar for an NRL club - played a bit of NRL but not a lot) has spent the past decade in Japan (where I met him) and France playing essentially reserve grade footy for $$$ (plus travel and language classes... speaks fluent Japanese and French as a result). Suits him because he is good enough to carve it up at that level without much effort, but not up to NRL standard.

[Thirteen]

Lovely insight. Thanks for posting.
Seems a top bloke.

[Intercept]

RoosterJ Really good read. Thanks for sharing.

[RoosterJ]

RoosterJ Really good read. Thanks for sharing.

All good...

There are quite a few articles from roosters on that website.

Here is another interesting one from Matto: