By Dan Walsh
When Isaiya Katoa prepared to stare Wayne Bennett down on the other end of a Zoom call for the first time, his Dad urged him to dress the part.
So, a few weeks short of his 18th birthday, Katoa wore his entire school uniform – Barker College tie, blazer and all – to meet the greatest coach in rugby league history.
Katoa is still only 20 and still learning on the run. But he’s also running a resurgent Tongan side against world champions Australia in Sunday’s Pacific Championships final.
His original three-year Dolphins deal, signed within a week of that first Zoom meeting with Bennett, has been upgraded to around $650,000-a-year and extended until the end of 2028.
Immortal Andrew Johns has described him as a “300-game halfback if ever there was one”. Mal Meninga, fellow Immortal and Kangaroos coach, has dubbed him “the next great halfback”.
Tongan and Dolphins officials are wary of the hype building around Katoa – with interview requests this week knocked back accordingly.
Leading the Pasifika rise: Tongan halfback Isaiya Katoa.Credit: Getty Images
Occasional comparisons to Nathan Cleary are eyed gingerly given the Panthers playmaker developed his game management and match-winning abilities quicker than any young half in memory, to the point Johns predicts he will finish his career as rugby league’s greatest ever.
Katoa’s own all-round game is progressing well after 44 NRL games, eight Tests for Tonga and a couple of demotions by Bennett.
Isaiya Katoa playing rugby for Barker College in his last year of school.Credit: Barker College
The most compelling trait he shares with Cleary could well be how the former Penrith junior talks of his craft, per a lengthy podcast with ex-playmaker Isaac John in July.
“The best thing I find about rugby league is there is always something to learn, there’s always something you can better yourself at, whether it’s your attack or your defence,” Katoa, the kid who first met Bennett wearing his school uniform, said.
“If you play halfback, it’s your kicking game, passing selection. Honestly, you make that many decisions in a game. Whether you’re going to get it wrong or right, that’s not the biggest thing.
“It’s always about, if you do get it right, ‘All right, what went right? What did you see, what made you make that decision?’
“Or if you got it wrong, ‘What’s the better decision to make there?’ I’ve always loved that about being a halfback, understanding that you’re not going to get every decision right.”
Cleary has long spoken about his own development in similar terms.
Much has been made of the round 20 golden point game Katoa dominated for 76 minutes, only to not take a late shot at field goal against the Panthers. Cleary nailed his own 43-metre match-winner soon after. But lost on most was the fact that Katoa was the closest Dolphins defender trying to pressure Cleary into error.
Katoa idolised Cleary while coming through the grades at Penrith and said so in the caption on a picture of the two halfbacks he posted to Instagram after that game.
Cleary praised him in turn as he floated “hopefully one day we can play on the same team”, though Tonga and Dolphins coach Kristian Woolf knows he has a halfback to build both a club and national side around.
It was Woolf who took Katoa to England in 2022 to be part of the Tongan camp while he was still completing HSC exams.
So impressed with the “chubby-cheeked” teen’s on- and off-field approach, Woolf played him in all but one World Cup game, and revelled in the improvement shown by Katoa as he kicked a match-winning field goal against New Zealand last week.
“He’s just an exceptional young man, very mature and very calm,” Woolf said.
“What I was happiest with against New Zealand, he had a very involved game against Australia [in Tonga’s 18-0 loss last month] but he did get a couple of things wrong execution-wise, kicked a few [grubbers] dead, a few kick-offs out.
Isaiya Katoa at Tongan training this week.Credit: Rhett Wyman
“They were the right play at the right time, but he didn’t quite nail it.
“As a young man, he could’ve gone into his shell the next game. He didn’t. He took the game on against New Zealand, he still played what he was seeing and he got the result at the end.”
Before Katoa took to the NRL and international stages with all the eyeballs and headlines they entail, he took similar strides with his last act as a Panthers player.
On the same CommBank turf that will host a sell-out on Sunday, Katoa kicked a 2022 extra-time field goal to win Penrith a Jersey Flegg premiership.
Isaiya Katoa celebrates his winning field goal in the 2022 Jersey Flegg grand final.Credit: NRL Images
He had missed a couple of one-point shots earlier in that game too, but interviewed afterwards by this masthead, was just grateful to be playing at all.
Katoa had signed with the Dolphins and the Panthers prioritised picking other young talents who were staying at the club.
Despite being headhunted by Bennett and regarded as one of the best young talents in the country, Katoa felt he “didn’t deserve” a Penrith recall because it meant another player would miss out.
In that Zoom meeting with Bennett several months earlier, the coach promised he would protect the young playmaker, ensure he wasn’t exposed before he was ready, and only reward Katoa when he had truly earned it.
Bennett duly picked him to debut in the Dolphins’ inaugural NRL game, has sent Katoa back to reserve grade twice to rediscover his running game, and encouraged a relationship with renowned sports psychologist Phil Jauncey to help the youngster cope with the pressure and expectation of being an NRL No.7.
Katoa the fan favourite.Credit: NRL Imagery
“Exactly how you’d want your young player or your own son looked after,” is how one Dolphins figure described Katoa’s progression.
Wearing his Tongan coaching hat, Woolf doesn’t shy away from the significance of the youngster’s development either.
Polynesian playmakers – led by grand final stars Jarome Luai and Jahrome Hughes – are emerging more and more from the path first trodden by Olsen Filipaina, then Stacey Jones and Benji Marshall.
The likes of Luai and Katoa stepping up to lead Samoa and Tonga respectively shapes as pivotal to the Pasifika nations’ rise, given their strength has typically been in the forwards.
“Isaiya’s development, and the development of other young halves for Tonga, it’s massive and that’s a big part of why we’re finding success,” Woolf says.
“Isaiya’s not the only one either. Young Latu Fainu at the Tigers would have been in our squad if not for injury and there’s a couple of guys a few years younger coming through as well. It’s the area we need to keep improving and a guy like Isaiya is at the forefront of that.
“The traits you see in him as a player are what you see in him off the field as well and that’s probably the most impressive thing about him.
“He’s going to get some things wrong and develop as he goes along. But for a guy his age, he’s got some attributes about him that say he’s going to handle those setbacks and most situations very well.”
Pacific Championships is Live and Free on Channel 9 & 9Now.