Canterbury’s NRLW recruit Tayla Preston keen to get a little Hazem El Masri kicking guidance
Canterbury’s first ever NRLW signing Tayla Preston grew up in Bulldogs mad household idolising club great Hazem El Masri. Now the halfback wants to add the ‘El Magic’ touch to her goal kicking in 2025.
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Canterbury’s inaugural NRLW signing Tayla Preston wants to join forces next season with another Bulldogs history maker in Hazem El Masri.
Growing up in a fanatical Bulldogs supporting family, a young Preston idolised El Masri, who rose to become the game’s greatest point scorer in 2009, a title he held until 2019 when Melbourne’s Cameron Smith eclipsed him.
El Masri, one of the greatest goal kickers of all time, was the reason the former Sharks playmaker picked up the kicking tee when she first started playing rugby league as a 15-year-old.
Now a Bulldogs ambassador, El Masri doesn’t have an official coaching role with the club but Preston would relish the chance to learn from the 2004 premiership winner to take her goal kicking to the next level.
Like the Bulldogs legend, Preston’s path to rugby league also started in the round ball game.
“I played soccer until I was 15 so I had a big boot on me … but I loved Hazem El Masri, especially his goal kicking. I definitely can’t kick like him. He wasn’t the biggest in stature but that never stopped him,” Preston said.
“I might have to ask him to see if he could help me out, that would be awesome.
“He had a completely different kicking style. I think he changed the way goal kickers were looked at in the sport.
“It would be pretty special to get the chance to learn or be guided by him to take my kicking to the next level.”
But for now Preston will have to settle for tips and advice from her father John, who not only was born and raised in Belmore but was also a goalkicking halfback in Canterbury’s lower grades in the 1980s.
“We’ve been going to the local park for the past two years a couple of times a week. I mean, he attempts to goal kick, I wouldn’t call him a goal kicker,” Preston said.
“He more so helps correct my technique. He helps me with more general play kicking. I always say ‘you give me the pointers but leave the goal kicking to me’.”
But not only is Tayla the better goal kicker, her father John proudly concedes she is far and away the best halfback in the Preston household, too.
“She’s got good organisational skills, she kicks very well and she gets the team around the park... they’re three elements that I had in my game,” John said.
“But my daughter is easily the better halfback.”
John always dreamt of running out onto Belmore Oval as a Bulldogs first grader, an ambition that will now be somewhat fulfilled through Preston next season.
“My dad couldn’t be more proud of me to be able to wear that jersey,” Preston said.
“For him growing up supporting them, playing for them, it’s a lifelong dream for him too.
“He always said he wished he played NRL, and I say to him now he can live that through me now.”
Unlike John, Preston isn’t a Bulldogs local junior despite helping guide Canterbury to the grand final in Harvey Norman Women’s premiership last year.
The Prestons moved to the Sutherland Shire, where Tayla was born and raised, in the early 1990s but their passion for the Belmore club never wavered.
“You could say we are a big Bulldogs family, Bulldogs mad even,” Preston said.
Preston still ‘pinches herself’ at the thought of now being able to wear the blue and white of the Bulldogs and follow in the footsteps of her favourite Canterbury players like El Masri, Josh Reynolds and Josh Morris.
“ I just have goosebumps because I know of the rich history they’ve had,” Preston said.
“As a young girl watching all those Bulldogs games and riding the highs and the lows.
“I’d shed a few tears every time they lost.
“To be the inaugural signing was just such a huge honour for me.
“I’m so grateful that the club trusted me and backed me. I hope I can repay them and lead the way for many years to come.”
While Preston grew up admiring some of the club’s best male players, the 25-year old wants to inspire Canterbury’s next generation of female stars.
Starting with another piece of Bulldogs history, helping guide the club to its first ever NRLW title.
“I always think how cool that would be to create history for the Bulldogs in that NRLW space and to win a premiership.
“That’s a goal I’ll be setting out to achieve for his club.”
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Originally published as Canterbury’s NRLW recruit Tayla Preston keen to get a little Hazem El Masri kicking guidance
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