Surprise name puts his stamp on NRL premiership ring

A rugby league Immortal has helped design the premiership rings that will be awarded to the winner of Sunday’s grand final decider between Penrith and Melbourne.

Whichever team wins the 2024 NRL and NRLW grand final will carry a piece of rugby league Immortal Ron Coote with them forever.

Coote, 79, has helped design the premiership rings to be awarded to the winners of Sunday’s decider games between Melbourne Storm and the Penrith Panthers for the NRL and the Sydney Roosters and Cronulla Sharks in the NRLW.

As a bonus, for the first time ever, Coote is being gifted by the NRL a special premiership ring himself after the Aussie sporting great lost his home and career memorabilia in the 2020 bushfires in Lake Conjola.

Rugby league Immortal Ron Coote has helped design the 2024 NRL premiership rings. Picture: Richard Dobson

“It is a great piece and I’d be very proud to wear it,” he said, showing off the white gold sparkler.

Coote joins an illustrious list of names to have previously helped Sydney’s Affinity Diamonds with its premiership ring designs, among them Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, former NSW Police Commissioner Mick Fuller and legendary rugby league commentator Ray Warren.

Valued at $10.000, the rings cannot be purchased. Each ring is encrusted with two carats of diamonds and feature an image of a young Coote on one side.

He played in nine grand finals and won two NRL premierships over his career, one each for the Rabbitohs and the Roosters.

In August, Coote was inducted as the 14th Immortal of the game. He is one of four living Immortals, the others being Wally Lewis, Mal Meninga and Andrew Johns.

“I am very proud and I feel wonderful that I’ve been made an Immortal,” Coote said.

The NRL 2024 Premiership ring.

“I hung in there for a lot of years ... and now it has all gone good, I’ve finally made it. I feel really proud of my career and what I’ve done. The game has changed a lot, for the better I think.”

Coote can still kick a footy and said he works out to maintain his fitness.

“I still train, not really hard but I’ve still got a gym in my shed at home with weights and bikes and those sorts of things,” he said. “I have all the equipment.”

In 2020, the premiership ring honoured Australia’s frontline heroes incorporating a picture of a firefighter and a nurse from Fire NSW Chief Superintendent Ken Murphy and Emergency nurse Lyndal Keith, while retired great of the game Johnathan Thurston created the 2019 ring. Affinity Diamonds has worked with the NRL to design and produce the premiership rings since 2015.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese helped design the 2023 NRL and NRLW premiership rings.

Coote’s advice for the grand final teams ahead of Sunday is simple although he was careful not to tip a favourite.

“I will be at the game, I haven’t missed one in 30 years or something,” he said.

“Whoever wins it, I am happy. Listen to what your coach tells you and follow on, go as hard as you can. Defence is what wins games, and you’ve got to tackle.”