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There’s been a few big moves made at the Roosters in the last few months. One saw a young star moved out of the first grade squad, binned off to reserve grade to find his form, while another saw one of the brightest talents decide that he will depart the club entirely, chasing another dream in another sport.
The conflicting futures of the Tricolours’ best two young players Sam Walker, the halfback extended through to the end of 2025, and Joseph Suaalii, who will depart at the end of 2024 – if not before, if you read recent reports – could not be more stark.
One has committed himself long term to the club, the other has not.
Their futures have been intertwined from the moment they started playing against adults. Both debuted in NSW Cup in the same game, on a park field in Blacktown, and got their first exposure to the big time two weeks later, when the usual NRL media pack turned up hours early to watch the boy wonder – Suaalii – play for Norths against Souths’ reggies.
And 80 minutes later they were raving about the other boy wonder, Walker, who went straight into first grade a week later.
Now, Walker is back in reggies on the back of perceived poor form, while Suaalii remains a constant in the Roosters side.
Suaalii, as every Roosters player is contractually obligated to mention, is a freak. Listen to interviews and they’ll tell you: nobody has seen anyone his age with that combination of size, speed and physicality. The raw materials are perfect for rugby, of both codes.
Walker is in many ways the opposite. He’s a pure footballer rather than an athlete, a guy who struggles against all odds not to be trampled on a weekly basis – even in NSW Cup – but is similarly capable of pulling off feats that make everyone forget that he is so young.
It’s a lot easier to keep the freak in the team, even though the stats would suggest that in this case, the player who might have benefited more from a stint in reggies might well have been Suaalii.
Obviously it could never happen: imagine the furore if the million dollar rugby convert was immediately deemed not good enough for the NRL. The smell of sour grapes would waft from Allianz Stadium over Moore Park Road to Rugby Australia’s posh digs.
Suaalii’s dream, prior to playing rugby union, was to be an NRL fullback. At the World Cup, he did a serviceable job of it with the ball, but was far from stellar at the finer points of positional play.
George Williams, England’s halfback, created five tries in two games against Toa Samoa through smart kicking that isolated a fullback who didn’t know where to stand a lot of the time.
Trent Robinson, who coached for France in the World Cup, was never going to dislodge James Tedesco, who captained Australia to the title in the No.1 jersey, or Joey Manu, who won player of the tournament at fullback for New Zealand, for Suaalii. When Teddy was out this year, Manu went into the fullback slot.
Instead, Robinson moved Suaalii to centre, and from thereon out, it has gone quite badly.
(Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)
Suaalii has been responsible for several key defensive errors, largely misreads caused by not knowing whether to turn out or in. Tyrell Sloan, Walker-esque in his small-body, high-skill style, made him look very silly indeed in the Anzac Day game.
With the ball, there’s a noted lack of guile. Suaalii has been worth two try assists in nine games in 2023 – and one of those came in the 55 minutes he got a fullback stint against Parramatta. His pass-to-run ratio is more in line with a second-rower or, indeed, a winger than a centre.
For all the good things Suaalii can do, his numbers as a centre are worse than Zac Lomax, who was dropped to reserve grade from the worst team in the league, and guys like Brian Kelly, Morgan Harper and Adam Pompey, all fairly average NRL players.
Moreover, moving Suaalii to the centres has blunted the stuff that he was actually really good at. He doesn’t get to start sets as often anymore, or return kicks, or finish tries at the corner.
All the things that made his reputation are diminished, but without adding the bits that could have rounded his game. Doubly strange is the decision to move him to centre when wing, in 2023 rugby league, is arguably the more important position.
At this point it’s worth considering Walker. Obviously, with one being an outside back and the other a half, direct comparisons are tough, but let’s get into it anyway.
Ostensibly, Walker was dropped because of defensive issues and lack of creativity in attack, though neither are particularly born out by the stats.
His tackling is an ongoing problem, but it’s not one that the Roosters weren’t willing to carry for his previous 50 NRL appearances and for what it’s worth, Walker has the fourth-best tackle efficiency of any NRL halfback to have played five games in 2023 and is fifth-best for line break causes. On numbers at least, that side of his game has improved massively.
Joseph Suaalii . (Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)
Walker runs with the best of them, has made the third-most line breaks per game played and in terms of breaks created, he’s around the level of Lachlan Ilias, Matt Burton and Daly Cherry-Evans. It’s not as if he was stinking the place out.
The replacement for Walker in the halves, Joey Manu, looked promising in fits and starts during the Anzac Day fixture, but had struggled badly in the two games since, with the team lacking creativity.
Manu is both a freak and a magician, the best of Suaalii and Walker combined, but the jury is still out on whether he is a half. That will doubtless come, but in the here and now, he’s not a better playmaker than Walker.
Given contracts, it would appear that the long term solution is Walker at 7 and Manu at 6, but that will never be allowed while Luke Keary is still playing, and in his defence, he has looked by far the most creative player the Roosters have in recent weeks.
But when a team is going badly, it has the effect of making those who aren’t playing look better every week.
With the Roosters, both key personnel moves seem to be having this effect. With Daniel Tupou out on one wing, the job of starting sets currently falls to Jaxson Paulo and Corey Allan.
It would probably be greatly assisted by the inclusion of Suaalii ahead of one of them. The Roosters are currently second-last for run metres, with Paulo averaging 30m fewer per game than Suaalii did in 2022, in a side that is third bottom for tries scored and fifth bottom for line breaks. They lack go-forward and creativity.
Going back to last year’s formula could go a long way to solving both issues.
(Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images)
Manu is already proven as a world-class centre and shifting him would allow Walker to slot back in with little being lost.
The stated purpose of the Kiwi’s move to five-eighth, to get more football in his hands, could be achieved in other ways that don’t involve their brightest young playmaker playing NSW Cup.
Robinson knows his players far better than any journalist does, and doubtless he will have his reasons for keeping Suaalii in the centres and putting Walker in reserve grade.
He has reiterated that Walker was sent down to work on aspects of his game, but wouldn’t be draw on what aspects they were.
Robinson has also spoken about the teething problems that Suaalii has had in learning to defend in the centres, but remains steadfast in his will to keep him there for the foreseeable future.
The worry for Roosters fans is threefold. Firstly, they have one key asset out of position and causing the team issues both in terms of what he is doing, by playing poorly in the centres, and what he is not doing, by playing well on the wing.
Secondly, they have another key asset not playing at all, while each week their attack looks worse and worse. Every week that Walker doesn’t play and the Roosters fail to score, that call looks more baffling.
Thirdly, they will remember last year. In 2022, the Roosters didn’t take the trials seriously and began the year underdone, before losing Keary to injury, prompting a spine switch that saw Manu in the No.6 jersey and Walker, who had been playing five-eighth, to halfback.
When Keary returned, he took the six jumper and with Walker at seven, the Chooks embarked on a winning run that saw them average 30 points a game.
It took the Chooks over half the season to work out their spine, and when they did, they were 10th in the ladder. Despite their unbeaten finish to the regular season, they only got one crack at finals and lost in week one.
It was in Round 16, against Penrith, where the renaissance started in 2022. Though they lost, the Roosters were the better side. From there out, it was as if a switch had flicked.
They travel to the foot of the mountains again this Friday night and will be looking for the same.
The team named for this weekend still has Suaalii at centre, Manu at five-eighth and Walker starting in the No.7 jumper in NSW Cup. If they lose again, and look bad again, Robinson will have to have a hard look at what he does going forward.