I shouldn’t even be in the NRL. Now the fate of Qld is in my hands
Gehamat Shibasaki will make a shock debut for Queensland in the State of Origin decider on Wednesday night and the Maroons bolter has exclusively revealed his driving force.
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Gehamat Shibasaki will make a shock debut for Queensland in the State of Origin decider on Wednesday night and the Maroons bolter has revealed his driving force – the disadvantaged youths he has left behind.
Just seven months ago, Shibasaki was earning $45 an hour as a social worker in Townsville, his big-time NRL career effectively over after failed stints at the Broncos, Knights, South Sydney and North Queensland.
A rugby league prodigy as a teenager, Shibasaki had managed just 30 NRL matches in six years and after one game at Souths last year, he returned to hometown Townsville to construct a new life in social work.
Then came the $1200-a-week lifeline from the Broncos that has inspired one of the biggest selection bombshells in Origin’s 45-year history, and given Shibasaki the ultimate stage to become the role model he promised to be.
The 27-year-old is the antithesis of the well-paid, pampered modern-day NRL star. Shibasaki doesn’t possess a $1 million contract like Broncos teammate Reece Walsh. He will run onto Sydney’s Accor Stadium as the lowest-paid player in State of Origin. His Broncos development deal is worth $85,000.
It was a deal he initially rejected because of his devotion to youth work … until he realised the power of not only talking the talk with disadvantaged youth, but walking the walk himself.
“If I can make a difference, or save one life, that’s a tick for me,” Shibasaki said ahead of the biggest game of his career.
“Wynnum Manly (Broncos feeder club in the Queensland Cup) offered me the chance to come down, but the reason I knocked it back at first was because I felt I was leaving behind some of these kids.
“I thought if football doesn’t work out for me, I would have to start again in Brisbane when I have already built a relationship with these kids that took me months and months to build.
“But I thought if I go down there, I can get something out of making it in the NRL and these kids will hopefully see what I am doing and be inspired themselves.
“It was hard to walk away from a job I loved, but I had to sit down and think about my responsibility to myself.
“I can’t be saying all these things and preaching to these kids if I can’t do it myself.
“In my mind, I couldn’t be a leader to others if I can’t fix myself first.”
Shibasaki hasn’t just fixed himself. He has stunned the rugby league fraternity with a Queensland Origin call-up that seemed as unlikely as winning Lotto when he lobbed at Broncos training last summer.
Underlining his dedication, Shibasaki briefly left behind his partner and young daughter in Townsville in his last roll of the dice to succeed in the NRL.
Against that backdrop, he was also wrestling with the emotions of letting down the posse of troubled kids whose lives he had committed to rebuilding.
During his stint with Pacific Supports & Mentoring, Shibasaki took on a group of eight clients aged between 12 and 18.
It was a job he never envisaged, but as his NRL dreams began to crumble, relegated to second-tier park football with the Townsville Blackhawks, Shibasaki found purpose in helping others.
“A lot of the stuff I did was based around kids with disabilities, but also supporting kids coming from troubled homes and stuck in tough environments,” he said.
“It meant I might take them to school in the mornings or making sure they get to their appointments.
“Sometimes we’d do some fun stuff like going to the movies or taking kids out for lunch to give them a good experience.
“I actually started to really enjoy the job and that’s why I wasn’t sure about moving to Brisbane because I was pretty content playing Queensland Cup and working on the side.
“I saw myself making a difference in these kids’ lives and that was as rewarding as anything.”
In his younger days, Shibasaki concedes he lacked the professionalism to live up to his potential. But working with disadvantaged youth provided another dimension, and life maturation, that has underpinned his resurrection with the Broncos.
Some of the stories broke his heart.
“I won’t go too deep but for some kids, it’s as simple as getting breakfast for them,” Shibasaki said.
“They wouldn’t have anything to eat or have anyone to take them to school, so I’d give them a lift.
“Some kids won’t have a bed to sleep in, so you try to find somewhere safe for them to sleep.
“For me, I took a lot of satisfaction out of making these kids happy to get up the next day.
“Some of them are coming in and out of juvenile detention, back into normal society, and you play your role in trying to get them back on track and setting goals for them at school.
“With disadvantaged kids, building that trust takes time and effort.
“It would be a slow process. I’d go to their houses and it starts off with me talking to them through the security screen door and then a couple of weeks later, we’re sitting on the front step having a chat.
“Eventually, they trust you to talk about their problems and I’ve had kids ask me to attend court with them because they have no-one else who cares enough to be there.
“To be able to show those kids that there are people out there who do care, and do want to give them a better life, that’s a win for me.”
In turn, without their knowledge, Shibasaki says his clients inspired him.
“It wasn’t easy at the start being back at the Broncos,” he said.
“I was way off the pace in training sessions. I wasn’t fit enough and I remember some days where I couldn’t even finish a session.
“But the hardships those kids had is what got me through.
“Teaching them to set goals helped me set little goals for myself through the tough times in my journey back at the Broncos.
“Every time I did it tough, I thought, ‘There’s kids out there that are doing it far worse than me’.”
Now Shibasaki is a State of Origin player, 10 years in the making, a living personification of the never-say-die spirit of a Billy Slater-coached Queensland side looking to celebrate a 45-year Maroons miracle in the Sydney decider.
No Queensland team in Origin history has recovered from 1-0 down to win a series with back-to-back victories on the road.
Broncos coach Michael Maguire said Shibasaki, a descendant of a Japanese pearl diver who emigrated to the Torres Strait in the late 1800s, is a poster boy for the NRL.
“’Gem’ is a lovely young man,” Maguire said.
“In my first meeting with him, I could see he was really hungry _ this was his final chance really.
“I’m impressed that Gehamat was prepared to move to Brisbane away from his family, it’s a big driver in why he wants to succeed here, doing it for his young one.
“He’s very coachable and I can’t tell you how hard he has worked to fight his way back here at the Broncos and win a State of Origin jumper for Queensland.
“No-one deserves it more.
“We are all very proud of Gem.”
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