Originally Posted by
mdrew
12. Ethan Roberts. He is a young utility player from Northern New South Wales, specifically the Grafton/Lismore area, who currently attends PBC and after an injury interrupted start to the year had a solid second season in MM, before playing the rest of the season in the Gold Coast Senior competition at both the U19 and First grade level for Tugun. At the U19 level he scored nine tries and a goal from 12 games and also scored a first grade try from his two or three first grade games. In MM he scored four tries and kicked two goals in his abridged MM season.
Previously he has represented NSW at the U16 level in 2013 where he started the game at five eight in the NSW win and was named player of the match in that interstate game and was roundly praised by Brad Fittler on social media. In MM he played at five eight and for Tugun he played five eight, back row and hooker and for the Titans U18 Invitational side he started at hooker and then played some back row when Jayden Parker came on to take over at hooker. He can be seen as the number nine in the video of the U18 Titans game on the Titans official site. He was originally contracted to the Brisbane Broncos who were the team that brought him up to PBC before coming over to the Titans. His young brother Blake played five eight for the Titans U15 squad against Balmain Tigers.
In attack, regardless of the position he is playing, he is quick and strong and has good footwork to beat opposition defenders and then has very good speed, not necessarily speed off the mark, but definitely has good top end speed once he gets moving. In MM he scored one or two tries from his own half where he stood up his opposing five eight and beat the cover defence over 60m. Similarly when breaks were made by the outside backs, he had the speed to keep up with them, I won’t say comfortably but he kept up speed wise. Where he excels is drawing defenders in to him and using his ball skills to put his runners into gaps, either through a short pass off his hip, like the Bulldogs forwards, or holding the ball until the last second when the defender commits and then gets the ball away, he is prepared to take the hit to open the gap in the defensive line.
In relation to his play at hooker his passing is reasonably crisp, especially to the right side, but on occasion he passes in two movements which is not surprising because prior to this year I am not aware of him playing hooker at all, obviously he is used to playing at five eight and has not quite transitioned yet to passing off the ground in one fluid movement. As he plays more at hooker, I would expect him to improve from the perspective of knowing when to run from dummy half.
On the field he so calm and collected and rarely makes the wrong decision with the football in his hands. You constantly see him talking to his team mates, letting them know what is going on and encouraging them, he just reads the play very well.
Defensively he is more than strong enough to defend in the middle of the ruck and quick enough to defend on the fridges when playing at five eight. In the centre of the ruck he sets a strong base to create the necessary leverage to defend against larger forwards and explodes upward through his core at very good initial contact regardless of the size of the attacker. When defending on the fringes of the ruck, he has the size and strength to handle wide running backrowers one on one and his lateral movement and anticipation are good enough to combat smaller quicker players without impacting on the integrity of his defensive technique.
He can also kick in general play, more so tactical kicks to gain ground rather than attacking kicks such as grubber kicks or bombs. I do not think that he will be a team’s primary general play kicker but has the skill set to be a secondary option when the primary kicker is under pressure and if he continues to play at hooker, he will need to work on getting his kicks away quickly to take full advantage of kicking from dummy half. Like his tactical kicking I do not think that he ends up as a primary goal kicker but is effective enough to be a secondary option, where he is accurate from close range but his accuracy suffers the wider out the kicks are from.
For the 2016 season it is hard not to see him not playing NYC next year for the Titans, the question is more around what position will he likely play. Based on this year he may well break into the NYC as a utility player off the bench, who can play five eight, hooker or as a ball playing backrower. For me his long term future is as a ball playing backrower who has the size and skill to operate effectively on the fringes of the ruck. If he does not start the season in NYC he should comfortably start the 2016 season in QCup Colts for the Tweed Seagulls while he waits for an opportunity to present itself. Playing against men for a couple of games for Tugun in the Gold Coast First Grade competition will hold him in good stead for next year.
From a player comparison perspective, a player with a similar style that I can think of is a physically smaller version of Canterbury Bulldog Greg Eastwood but a similar skill set as a back rower who has good ball skills in the fringes of the ruck and is faster than he is given credit for. He just looks like a natural footballer who was born to play rugby league, I really think that this young player has a massive future.