At its best, an NRL team has a spine of four players with rapid shutter eyes capable of processing the kaleidoscope of play in a nanosecond and capitalising on the whirling geometry of both the attack and defence, a middle of big honest bodies who grind out a way forward in a triumph of dated virtues and, finally, edge players who display a fundamental elegance, with wingers blessed with seemingly spring-loaded feet, soaring above all for a high ball and bodies so acrobatic they can force the ball for a try millimetres from touch.
So how to you rank the top 30 of the 510-plus players in the NRL? Just ask 10 judges, including an Immortal and two potential Immortals-in-waiting, as well as another seven invested observers of the game, to ignore any criteria and declare, as Tina Turner famously sang, who is “simply the best.”
As readers of this week’s series on the NRL’s top 50 will be aware, the list bears no relationship to the 30-man squads all 17 NRL clubs are required to lodge with headquarters before season kick off. The club lists are position-oriented, basically two teams of 15.
However, when Andrew Johns, Brad Fittler and Darren Lockyer – together with Nine Entertainment journalists and commentators – rank their top 30, a top 50 emerges, producing conclusions both obvious and unexpected.
Nathan Cleary is the standout superstar. All 10 judges ranked the Penrith halfback No.1, with 30 points, meaning his combined score was a maximum 300. Furthermore, he is 25 points clear of No.2: Newcastle’s Kalyn Ponga. Cleary was always going to tally highly following his brilliance in the 2023 NRL grand final but may not have registered so powerfully if the poll had been conducted during last year’s Origin series. Recency bias has an obvious influence. Had a similar poll been conducted the day after the third Test versus Great Britain in 1974 at the SCG, Graeme Langlands, an Immortal, would have been the unanimous choice of all judges. Ditto Johns when he won successive Dally M medals, or Lockyer and Fittler after one of their one-man shows. Finishing on top of our top 50 doesn’t make Cleary an Immortal yet.
Nathan Cleary poses with the NRL premiership trophy after Penrith’s third straight grand final win.
The NRL competition is lopsided. If the 50 players were distributed evenly among the 17 clubs, all but one club should have three players on the list. However, more than half the competition is below average, with nine clubs having only one or two players represented. The Knights, Raiders, Bulldogs, Wests Tigers, Sharks and Dragons each have only a single player in the list, while the Eels, Dolphins and Titans have two each. Recency bias again has a role with none of these clubs progressing to the final four last season.
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