Flipper the script: Could Milford’s Dolphins move help resurrect his career?

Will Dolphins star recruit Anthony Milford ever recapture the form that established him as one of the NRL’s leading men?

After kicking off his Broncos career in 2015 as a hot-stepping livewire and becoming the club’s first million-dollar man in 2017, he too often failed to live up to the expectations that came with the price tag and was eventually moved on at the end of 2021.

Upon resuming his career in 2022 with the Newcastle Knights, Milford once again struggled to make an impact in a side already facing its nadir.

At 28, despite his unquestionable natural talent, the prospect of his career being best remembered as unfulfilled is becoming increasingly real. However, could a seachange to Redcliffe be just the thing that the man known as ‘Milf’ needs to finally turn things around?

Being a great game manager or a leader of men has never come naturally to Milford. He’s an attacking dynamo who can break a game open with deft footwork, blistering pace, or a cheeky offload. It should come as no surprise then, that Milford played his best football alongside Ben Hunt.

While Hunt was Brisbane’s halfback, he took on more of the organisational and kicking responsbilities. In the run to the 2015 grand final, when Milford was at his peak, his touches per game were among his lowest compared with the rest of his career, with just 38 per game. For perspective, in 2015 the game’s elite halves averaged around 50 per game, with Johnathan Thurston up around 60.

What Milford did with those touches, however, was all the more effective. He managed 13 line breaks, 16 line break assists, 14 try assists, 3.3 tackle breaks per game and 13 tries for good measure. Although his overall figures were impressive, they weren’t world-beating, but they didn’t have to be when the Broncos also had both Hunt and a firing Darius Boyd to spearhead their attack. The team got just what they needed out of Milf.

Anthony Milford (Photo by Tony Feder/Getty Images)

Despite a few ups and downs, 2016 also saw Milford at his prime. With slightly more receipts at 40 per game, Milford registered 16 try assists, 13 line breaks, 21 line break assists while crossing the stripe on 14 occasions. He followed up in 2017 by recording 15 try assists and 17 line break assists over 23 games.

In the seasons following Hunt’s departure from Queensland, Milford’s overall involvement increased: 2018 and 2019 saw his touches increase to 45 and 46 receipts per game, respectively. Partnered with essentially another running half in Kodi Nikorima, Milford also assumed the vast majority of the kicking duties, topping the league for kicking metres in 2018, almost triple what he produced in 2017.

However, the extra ball and added responsibility did not lead to improved attacking output. Across 25 games in 2018 Milford’s attacking output dropped across a number of areas including line break assists (9), try assists (12), tackle breaks (2.68), tries (6), while recording 13 line breaks. 2019 saw Milford manage similar figures, managing just nine line breaks, eight line break assists, 13 try assists and six tries.

While the numbers aren’t altogether terrible they were well off the pace of the competition’s elite halves, pointing to a steady decline in Milford’s attacking prowess which only worsened during the Broncos’ diabolical 2020 campaign.

At the same time, Milford became less willing to back his greatest asset, which is his running game. In 2016 and 2017, he was among the game’s most active at engaging the defensive line with 5.4 per game. By 2020, as form and confidence deserted him, his line engagements per game almost halved to 2.8.

Fast forward to 2023 and enter Sean O’Sullivan, the man to partner Milford in the halves at the Dolphins, who Andrew Johns rates as having one of the best footy IQs in the game.

Having suffered three ACL injuries already, O’Sullivan can’t rely as much on explosive pace or evasiveness, instead using his footy smarts to lead his side out on the pitch. He showed just how astutely he can perform this role for Penrith throughout 2022 when Nathan Cleary was sidelined. While deputising for the Panthers’ maestro, O’Sullivan racked up 11 try assists and 11 line break assists in just 13 games, and averaged a handy 300 metres per game with the boot.

An expansion club is naturally a different matter to playing at a rugby league juggernaut such as Penrith. But O’Sullivan’s success didn’t come by accident, either. Just ask Brodie Croft, who found while at the Storm that you can come in to the best system in the world, but it can still go awry if you’re not the right man to steer the side.

In O’Sullivan, Milford now has something he has sorely lacked since Hunt’s 2017 departure from the Broncos – a genuine on-field general who can rally his team around the paddock, enabling Milf to focus on lighting up the attack.

Milford has no doubt been in this situation before. In 2020 Croft was supposed to be the yin to Milford’s yang when he joined the Broncos, but was badly out of his depth in an underperforming side. Incidentally, he’s flourished while playing as a running half since joining Salford last season.

Adam Clune could have similarly been a useful foil for Milford, but Milf’s belated entry to the Knights’ 2022 season, which was already in turmoil, meant forming a dynamic attacking duo was always going to be a tall ask.

However, a number of the right ingredients are now in place for Milford at the Dolphins – the million-dollar albatross around his neck is now gone, he has a genuine game-managing half with whom he’s had a full off-season to build a combination, and a handy spine with the likes of Hamiso Tabuai-Fidow and Jeremy Marshall-King.

Then, of course, there’s that touch of magic dust from Wayne Bennett, a man who has stood by Milford through thick and thin.

Maybe, just maybe, in 2023 Milford can rediscover that Midas touch that once had him among the game’s elite.