Darren Lockyer inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame
DARREN Lockyer is set to join the likes of Mal Meninga and Wally Lewis as an inductee to the Sport Australia Hall of Fame but, had it not been for a move to the bush when he was a kid, he may never have played the sport that made him a household name.
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RUGBY league legend Darren Lockyer was nine when he first dreamt of wearing the coveted green-and-gold jumper.
It was 1am in the tiny Queensland bush town of Wandoan and a bleary-eyed Lockyer would rise from his bed, switch on the television and watch his Australian rugby league heroes going toe-to-toe with their British rivals some 15,000km away on the 1986 Kangaroo tour.
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As he gazed at his idol, Queensland five-eighth Wally Lewis, skippering Australia to Ashes glory, Lockyer never imagined he would one day scale the greatest summits of rugby league.
Now, three decades later, Lockyer – a Broncos, Queensland and Australia captaincy icon – will join “The King” Lewis in the Sport Australia Hall of Fame.
The 41-year-old Lockyer will become just the 24th rugby league player to receive the ultimate coronation, at the 34th Induction and Awards gala dinner on October 11.
Only five Queensland-born league greats have been added to the Sport Australia Hall of Fame – Arthur Beetson, Tom Gorman, Allan Langer, Mal Meninga and Lewis.
It is fitting that Lockyer should be No. 6 … for it is the jersey number he wore with distinction during his glittering and record-breaking 16-year career in the Australian rugby league premiership.
“It’s a wonderful honour,” he said.
“I started watching rugby league in the mid-to-late 1980s when State of Origin was huge.
“I remember watching the 1986 series. Queensland got dusted 3-0, and later that year there was the Kangaroo tour to the UK.
“I would get up in the middle of the night to watch the Australia-Great Britain Tests and that’s when my passion for the green-and-gold jumper was born.
“An everlasting memory for me was Wally Lewis’ feats wearing the Queensland and Australia jumpers.
“As a kid from Queensland, it made me want to get out there and emulate my heroes.
“I had posters of Wally Lewis and Allan Langer on my wall. I ended up playing with ‘Alf’ (Langer) at the Broncos and got to work with Wally Lewis (as rugby league commentators) at Channel 9, so it’s pretty surreal.
“To go on and represent Australia and wear the No. 6 jumper worn by Wally, one of my idols, shows that dreams do come true.”
The truth is Lockyer’s first real sporting dream was to be a star in Australian rules. Then a twist of fate involving his parents, Sharon and David, changed everything. Lockyer’s father, David, played AFL for 10 years at Brisbane club Morningside and handed a Sherrin to his son at the age of four.
Darren was soon registered with his dad’s club and excelling in the code when David received a job offer that meant not only a change of postcodes for the family, but a change of sports.
“I didn’t have a choice but to play rugby league,” Lockyer says with a laugh.
“Mum and Dad got a job opportunity to move to Wandoan to run a truck stop, so we left Brisbane.
“Dad looked after the fuel and Mum ran the cafe at the truck stop, and in that town there was no Aussie rules so they signed me up for rugby league.
“My first team was the Wandoan Wildcats. We wore Maroon with a big white V and it was so dry out there you would play barefoot in dirt and dust.
“If I stayed in Brisbane, I would have stayed with AFL for sure. I loved Aussie rules and I knew nothing about rugby league.
“I was really upset when I had to stop playing Aussie rules, but I soon developed a passion for league.”
Spotted by legendary Brisbane scout, the late Cyril Connell, Lockyer was a revelation at the Broncos.
He enjoyed a sensational debut against Parramatta as an 18-year-old in 1995, and within two years he won the first of four premierships with the Broncos.
Lockyer twice won the Golden Boot Award as the world’s best rugby league player, in 2003 and 2006.
For six years following his retirement in 2011, Lockyer was the most-capped player in State of Origin and NRL history (36 games for Queensland, 355 matches for the Broncos) until Storm captain Cameron Smith broke both records last year.
But Lockyer remains Australia’s most-capped player with 59 Tests, a milestone that may never be beaten.
While Lockyer found early inspiration in rugby league legends, he also holds great admiration for Australia’s finest sporting champions.
“I’ve always had enormous respect for our Olympic and Commonwealth Games athletes,” he said.
“I remember Kieren Perkins winning gold from lane eight at the 1996 Olympics and I recall the footage of Robert de Castella winning the marathon at the 1982 Commonwealth Games. I was only five at the time.
“I was also there the night Cathy Freeman won gold at the 2000 Olympics.
“The atmosphere as Cathy rounded the bend and stormed home to win was just electric.
“It’s one thing to be recognised in your sport but to be in the Sport Australia Hall of Fame alongside Olympians, it’s a new stratosphere and very humbling.”
