NRL Grand Final: ‘You become a different beast’ - NRL hitman Liam Martin on the art of white line fever

Penrith Panthers powerhouse Liam Martin takes his role as the enforcer for Sunday’s NRL Grand Final, but one chat during the week reveals a completely different persona.

Panthers backrower Liam Martin. Picture: Jonathan Ng

Here’s Liam Martin. The animal. A grub, according to Queenslanders. Quick chat, mate? I expect he’ll throw me through the window. Smash a chair across my back. Drive a shoulder into my ribs. Sledge me. Grab me by the throat and say, “Last time I saw a head like yours, it had a hook in it!” Instead, he speaks and behaves like an angel. A hard-edged angel, the best sort of angel, an angel exuding a complete absence of bullshit.

He grins and leans casually against a wall as if we might share a cigarette and life stories. On his way home, I reckon he might have helped a little old lady cross Mulgoa Road – if she really needed it. I’m somewhat shocked by our completely agreeable encounter. Is this really the Penrith Panthers’ feared hitman for Sunday night’s NRL grand final against Melbourne Storm? The fella Queenslanders call a grub every State of Origin series?

“I do try to enjoy my life, you know,” he laughs. “Which I guess probably surprises a few people. Sometimes people don’t realise there’s more to footy players than playing footy. When I’m in a game, I have a job to do. That’s all I’m doing. It’s my job to play in a certain way. I want to play that way, I’ve always played that way, I don’t know any other way to play.

“But what you see on the football field can be totally different to what we are as people in our real lives. Watching someone play footy or any sport can give you the totally wrong idea about who that person actually is.”

Martin puts me in a head lock, flushes my head down the toilet and ... does nothing of the sort. He smiles constantly. Doesn’t have a hint of arrogance. Laughs frequently. League’s hitmen occasionally have heads big enough for lighthouses but Martin exudes harmless mischieviousness and warmth. “I’m pretty relaxed in my day-to-day life,” he says. “I love a good laugh and a bit of a prank. I like messing around. I’m not too serious at all.”

Seriously?

“Seriously,” he grins. “Even on grand final day, I’ll be pretty relaxed during the day. I want to save my energy for when I’m out on the field. I try to take my mind off it. When I’m getting ready to go to the ground, that’s when I start getting into the groove. There’s a game coming up, a big game, you know it’s going to be physical, you want to rip in. I’ll do whatever you can to win. I’ve been like that my whole life and I won’t be changing any time soon.”

Martin celebrates Penrith qualifying for a fifth-consuective grand final.

WHITE LINE FEVER

Martin is the walking, talking, big-hitting, bruising, bone-jarring epitome of white line fever. To the untrained eye, the Penrith Panthers enforcer will run out against the Storm and go berko. But there’s a speckless method to the madness and mayhem – his exemplary tackling technique, his instinctive ability to run the right lines in attack and the thunderous competitiveness you get from growing up by being belted in backyard games by a brother, an eternally beloved older brother, six years old than you.

White. Line. Fever. Berko. Nobody does it better than Martin. “Yeah,” he blushes. “That’s what it is. White line fever. I’m not one who’s very superstitious or has routines to get into that sort of mood. It just happens. I chop and change before a game and don’t have any rituals and stuff. Our warm-up is probably when the fever starts clicking in. When the blood starts boiling and that whole feeling comes over you. It’s nerves and adrenaline and excitement and I love it. The nerves are good. I’ve always been told, and I always remind myself, you get nervous because what you’re about to do means something to you. All your teammates are bubbling with the same nervous energy and you’re feeding and bouncing off each other. Then you run onto the field and turn into a bit of a different person. You become a different beast. That’s the white line fever.”

Martin says: “White-line fever, to me, means competitiveness. Doing whatever it takes, within reason, to win for your team. This is what’s been instilled in me my whole life – whenever you do something, do it the best you can. It doesn’t have to be just footy. Whatever you do, you can do it with a bit of white-line fever. I reckon it just means you’re having a go.”

The 27-year-old Martin went to school at West Wyalong High in the Riverina region of NSW, where people have a go, and played juniors for the Temora Dragons, where Martin would have begun his reign of terror if his body was big enough to have a proper go. He’s a late bloomer in the NRL, but a blooming great one, debuting in the backrow for the Panthers aged 22 before his meteoric rise to being a three-time premiership winner, Test regular and just about the first bloke picked for NSW in State of Origin.

White. Line. Fever. ““I had it in juniors but I probably wasn’t as good,” he laughs. “I definitely wasn’t as good. I played hooker when I was younger because I was a bit smaller. I had the same competitive drive but it wasn’t until later that my body caught up to the way I was thinking. Before then, I’ll be honest with you, mate, I wasn’t much chop.”

Martin hits a gap during the preliminary final against Cronulla.

MY TEACHER

He’s plenty of chop now. And doing a bloke called Jarred proud. Jarred was on track for an NRL career while playing alongside future internationals Jack Wighton and Josh Papali’i for the Canberra Raiders Under 20s. Two ACL injuries stopped Jarred’s playing days in his tracks. A decade ago, Jarred took his own life. He was the brother, the eternally beloved older brother, who used to give Martin the treatment in their backyard games out in the sticks.

In an interview on the Panthers website, sitting in the back of a ute, an achingly no-bullshit Martin says: “I’m the youngest of five. I’ve got two older brothers and two older sisters. Mum and dad separated when I was probably about one, so I grew up with mum on the farm. My brother was about six years older. We used to play footy together in the backyard. Being six years older than me, he was a bit bigger and would rough me up. Playing knee-footy, he’d be smashing me. He’s the one who taught me the most about footy. He was my idol growing up. I was always told about how tough he was and that was pretty much who I wanted to be.”

OLD SCHOOL

Martin ties me to a tree, daks me and ... he does nothing of the sort. He’s an old-school footballer who could have played in the rough and tumble of 50 years ago. He talks about footy like he’d gladly have a game right now in the car park.

“You know what I love about it?” he says. “The mateship. Honestly. The moments in footy you enjoy with your mates that no-one else will ever know about. When you finish a game and you sit there and have a laugh about something that happened in a game that only us as players, who have been through it together, know about. We enjoy that. The little moments that make it special. Even at training, you can be having a tough day then something happens and everyone has a laugh – you share a lot of those moments over the course of a season. Thirty, 40 years from now, I’m sure we’ll be sitting around and reminiscing about the good times we’re having right now. These memories and friendships and mateships are going to stay with us forever. I’m loving it at the moment. Loving every day.”

The Temora boy carries the support of a hardcore rugby legaue town on his broad shoulders.

FEEDING THE CROWD

Martin mocks my broken nose and freckled skin and says nobody reads newspapers anymore and … he does nothing of the sort. His most ferocious tackles make a victim’s back teeth rattle. What’s that feeling like? Of absolutely nailing a bloke? “Aw! I don’t know how to put that into words,” he grins. “When it comes off and you get the timing right, I’d honestly rather do a good hit than score a try. That’s the sort of person I am. It just surges you with energy. You can be as tired as buggery but you land a hit and you’re instantly re-energised. So’s your team. That’s a big part of it. You’re doing it for your teammates. You want it to drive everyone else forward. They start feeding off it and so does the crowd and the atmosphere changes. You know when you’ve got it right and it feels … perfect.”

Geez, I hope there’s an afterlife. So blokes like Liam and Jarred Martin can get together again. Liam is no giant but at 183cm and 103kg, he’s a weapon, a berko, no-bullshit human missile, throwing himself around like he’s still up against blokes six years more advanced. Animal? In a sporting sense, yes. Which is a compliment. Grub? Another compliment, when it comes from Queenslanders during Origin.

LEAVE THE SLEDGING

He shrugs off his rivalry with the Storm’s Cam Munster. “I’ll just going after him physically,” he deadpans. “I’ll leave the sledging to the other boys. I’m not witty enough. Someone else can sledge for me.”

Hey, Munster! Last time Liam Martin saw a head like yours, it had a hook in it!

Jarred passed at the age of 22, which was Liam’s age when he made his debut for the Panthers in 2019. The jersey presentation was one of the best. Martin bawled his eyes out when club legend Royce Simmons welcomed him to first grade. “I lost my brother five years ago,” Martin told his new teammates. “I never got to play footy with him. Every time I step on the field, I just hope I’m doing him proud.”

More often than not, Martin plays with one word written on his wrist strap: “Jarred.” He says my questions are boring and my writing is rubbish and … he does nothing of the sort. It’s been an enchanting and enlightening conversation. Too early in the week for white line fever.