There’s a memorable scene in Good Will Hunting when Chuckie (Ben Affleck) gives best mate Will (Matt Damon) some home truths about squandering his talents: “Look, you’re my best friend, so don’t take this the wrong way but, in 20 years if you’re still livin’ here, comin’ over to my house, watchin’ the Patriots games, workin’ construction, I’ll f***in’ kill ya.”
Raiders hooker Josh Hodgson wouldn’t admit to being any sort of maths genius and/or intellectual savant, but had he not been a professional footballer there’s every chance he’d have been labouring, mixing plaster, slapping it about.
But when he runs out onto Canberra’s hallowed turf he’s representing five brothers, his cab-driving dad, Dave, and foster home-working mum, Nicci, who sets her alarm at all hours to catch her son’s games.
There’s dozens of mates doing their best on freezing building sites around northern England, and Hodgson represents them all, and all those who’d love to be in his place. He’s living aspirations. Not the least his own.
Hodgson grew up in Hull and lived in housing estates with his mum and dad, brother Nathan and four older half-brothers. Dave played for Hull FC and all the sons played rugby league at various levels. Nathan had the talent. But Josh had the drive. And the belief.
“Whenever someone asked what I was going to do when I left school I’d I’d tell them I’m going to play rugby league, be a professional footballer,” says Hodgson. “It sounds weird to say it, but I always thought that I could. I was quite a competitive kid and always said to myself I was going to do it.”
Hodgson reckons he was “never the most naturally gifted kid”. Nathan was always far more talented and looked like he was going to be the superstar. Hodgson thought he’d be “the stock standard, steady player”. Yet while he might not have been that good at maths, he worked one thing out – talent is good; but hard work has no substitute.
“I had to really work hard, and I still do, on all my parts of my game,” says Hodgson. “Nathan kind of lost interest in rugby aged about 15, 16. Me and him was chalk and cheese – he had all the talent and I had to work hard for what I got. But I think in saying that when you work hard for what you get it makes you appreciate it a lot more.”
While other kids were out boozing on Saturday nights, Hodgson and a mate, Tom Monaghan, would go out with them – but take a rugby ball rather than a can of lager. They’d muck around with the footy. As their mates fell over, they’d look after them.
Each year, as he grew, he improved. From 15 onwards he made Academy sides, worked out that he’d have to sacrifice to get where he wanted to be. He made England Under-17s. Debuted professionally for Hull FC in the footsteps of his old man.
“For anybody, making your debut is massive,” says Hodgson. “But to do it for Hull FC, where my dad played, and where I’d spent a lot of time … I’d come through the scholarships since I was 13. They were the only club I knew, the staff were the only people I knew. People like Steve Crooks when I was there, Andy Last, Colin Stephenson. Lee Radford was my amateur coach growing up at East Hull. I’ve still got good friends there. They’re very good at bringing kids through.”
So good they couldn’t hold on to this one. Hodgson was the rookie behind established men Shaun Berrigan, Danny Houghton and Tommy Lee. When Hull Kingston Rovers came a-calling, it was an emotional decision to leave the club he’d grown up in. But ultimately it was an easy one.
“I was fourth in the pecking order at Hull FC. I’d had a couple of games at loose forward and in the backrow. Then I got approached by Justin Morgan who explained that [former Wests Tigers utility] Daniel Fitzhenry was going back to Australia and they only had Ben Fisher there at the time.It was a real opportunity to establish myself as a first grade player,” he says.
Hodgson would play 136 games for the club, score 37 tries. Ask him today who he supports and there’s no pause – “Hull KR, fantastic club”. From there he won selection for England on the 2014 Four Nations Tour of Australia and New Zealand. His Test debut came against Samoa, a 32-26 win. Then came Australia, in Melbourne, and a 16-12 loss after leading 12-4 at half-time. Hodgson had never played against NRL players and could be excused for finding the pace a bit hot. But he offers no excuses himself.
“I’m my own biggest critic,” he says. “And if I’m honest I was really disappointed in myself. As much as it was nice to debut for your country, you want to play well and be successful. I don’t just want to make up numbers or tick a box.
“The game over here, especially the international game, it was another level. I’d only ever played in the Super League and wasn’t expecting it to be as fast. I was a couple of steps off the mark. To play against Australia, NRL players, them types of players, for the first time, it was an eye-opener about how much better you needed to be.”
He headed straight to Canberra and pre-season training in the heat. As ever, he sought to improve through attrition. He would play every one of Canberra’s games in 2015. And here he is today, after five rounds of season 2016, leading the NRL’s Dally M standings. Bookmakers have him 4-1 favourite (with Johnathan Thurston) to win it. Pundits have him up with established internationals, James Graham and Sam Burgess, as the NRL’s premier Poms. Hodgson is, in the local parlance, ‘killing ‘em.’
His work out of dummy-half is dynamic and slick, the role today much like a rugby union halfback’s going ruck-to-ruck, delivering ball to the next rampaging forward or speed man out wide. He can go himself, run and pass, or kick. His 40-20 against the Roosters won the game. Where the No9’s role differs from union is that the league man may have to make fifty tackles.
“As a hooker, when you’re playing big minutes. you’re going to get spotted up and you have to do a lot of tackling,” says Hodgson. “So defensively I need to be smarter. I’ve got to try to do maybe not as much tackling as I maybe normally would. If you punch out a lot of minutes you’ve got to catch a breather here and there. You’ve got to be smart match-wise.
“But really, in all areas, I”m trying to be the best I can be.”
It’s that work ethic that impressed former St Helens’ coach Nathan Brown who tipped off Ricky Stuart about the young hooker. The Raiders made enquiries and heard Hodgson was interested in the NRL. Stuart watched a few Super League games and saw something in him. But it was the work ethic that got the Hull man over the line. And in his competitive streak, Stuart saw a fellow traveller.
On arrival in Canberra he was met by his girlfriend, now fiancée, Kirby, who’d been in town a week. Club man Dave Thom showed the couple around the city, organised phones, groceries, saw them settled into their apartment. And the couple has loved the city since. Hodgson reckons he’ll settle down here, build a house. He’s applied for permanent residency. He’s applied to be married. He may never leave.
“We’d been told, everyone that we’d mentioned it to said why are you going to Canberra. I was thinking it can’t be very nice. And then we got here and it’s very nice and we were saying what was everybody talking about. Rubbish! We love it. Only thing it hasn’t got is a beach. But I’m too scared of sharks anyway!”
And so here he is, Josh Hodgson, once a skinny try-hard for East Hull ARLFC, now perhaps the Raiders’ best hooker since the great Steve Walters. He’s 26 years old, a senior player and a voice in the dressing room and on the field. And given his form and that of his halves, Aiden Sezar and Blake Austin, a quality fullback in Jack Wighton (whom Hodgson says is a “fantastic talent, freakishly strong and among the best fullbacks in the game”), and a typically monstrous forward pack and slick outside backs, this looks the Raiders’ best chance of going deep into finals football since Laurie Daley retired in 2000.
But Hodgson isn’t getting ahead of himself – like Raiders fans, he’s been hurt before. And anyway, his brothers and mates would never let him. Hodgson knows who he is, where he is, and where he’s come from.
“When I was 14, 15, in the school holidays I’d work as a labourer for my brother, Alan. As soon as I finished school I was on building sites. When you work all day, then train four nights a week, play on the weekend, it’s a lot of hours.
“When you’re able to play football full-time you appreciate doing something you love. Experiences like that, they keep you grounded. And I’ve got a great family, they’re all hard-working, my brothers are all down-to-earth. They’d never let me get away from the fact that working hard is what will get me where I need to be.”
