26 sleeps to go

Just 26 sleeps to go now until NRL 2013 and, at the very least, writing these each day has helped pass the time for me, the days are just flying by! So before settling in for the All Star game this evening, it's time to reveal number 26 in my best players in the NRL countdown, 

#26 Akuila Uate

He goes by many names, Choc, Aku, Akuila the Thriller, The Fijian Flyer, that fast Fijian dude, the guy that scores all the tries for Newcastle, or simply the best winger in the NRL. At 25, the 187cm 96kg rocket from Votua Fiji, as monopolized the Dally M Winger of the year award in recent times. In what some referred to as a "down season" Uate for the third consecutive year picked up the award, becoming only the second player in history (after St George great Nathan Blacklock) to achieve the three peat. In fact no other player has even won the award in back to back years, and no player has ever won the award more than three times. At his age, it's quite conceivable that Uate will be in contention for the award for a few years to come and he'd be the odds on favourite to pick it up in 2013. The down year for the Thriller consisted of having the 7th most runs of all backs in the competition, 3rd in tries and 6th in tackle busts, it says a lot about Akuila that being the best in the competition in your position and scoring the 3rd most tries in the comp isn't quite up to standard.

In Fiji, this is considered a brisk walk

Akuila is the prototypical Fijian winger, very reminiscent of former Fijian Rugby international Rupeni Caucaunibuca without the whole cashing in in the UK then turning fat and lazy thing. He's lightning quick and packs a very solid frame which sees him bump out of tackles with ease, Andrew Johns described him as having "a backside you could sit a drink on" and I'm sure Joey is an expert on sturdy support structures to plant your beverage. At 17, Uate ran a 10.9 100 metre time, and while piling on the additional muscle likely has restricted Uate's speed from what it could truly be, he's still quite possibly the faster bloke in the NRL, Johns wasn't just impressed with his behind "In all my years in rugby league I've never seen a better athlete than this bloke". To cap off his fantastic athletic exploits, Uate is just a joy to watch, his great speed is coupled with a beautiful step, and he smiles more than Manu Vatuvei. The huge smile across his face has become the trademark of his personality, he seems to so genuinely enjoy himself and his spirit is infectious, he's one of the most popular players in the league, he's charismatic, he's an entertainer. Do you know anyone who doesn't like Uate? if so, they're probably a horrible person.

It takes heaps of muscles to frown but smiling is easy as

The awards list grows by the year, and he has a growing list of representative honours to go along with them. As it stands, Akuila has played 4 tests for his native Fiji, 5 tests for Australia, 5 Origin's for New South Wales and 1 game for NSW country as well as an All Star game appearance. In a time where it seems every team has an amazing fullback and the rep teams are cramming fullbacks on to the wings to fit all these talented guys in, Akuila stands tall as one of the true star wingers in the game, capable of keeping all of these wing spot stealing fullbacks at bay. 

But once I found out Fiji was actually in New South Wales I said I'm in!

It was however on the grand stage of Origin that Uate's performances attracted many of the detractors in 2012. After starting all three Origin's for NSW in 2011 and the first two in 2012, Uate was dropped for the deciding third match after some less than stellar performances. Questionable under the high ball, hands that couldn't be trusted, suspect on defence, certainly not the type of description you want to make of someone on leagues most intimidating stage. What Uate can do with the ball in hand was never to be questioned, but despite his threatening influence on attack, the potential to exploit him on defence was a negative that was deemed to outweigh the positives. But by all accounts, Akuila took it in stride, harboured no resentment, and was texting his NSW team mates messages of support moments after learning of his fate. It's that kind of approach that leads me to believe that he will bounce back from this just fine, for a player with the right attitude, being dropped in the long run can be a good thing and besides, despite his poor 2012 Origin exhibition, generally the traffic is flowing more swiftly in Akuila's direction...

The short lived 1 point per try rule proved largely ineffective 

Uate won't be the most well rounded player on this list, far from it, and he may be a guy with several things to work on, but what he brings to the table is a phenomenal athlete unparalleled in this competition. At the end of the day to win in this competition you need to score tries and prevent tries being scored. Akuila and his 70 tries in 90 appearances makes a stronger contribution to most when it comes to the former. The rest can be worked on, certainly with Bennett continuing to be on the scene at Newcastle he'll be doing all he can to help smooth the edges of his raw talent and Akuila is a good enough bloke between the ears to be willing to learn. Uate brings the things that you can't teach, whether you're Bellamy or Bennett or Gus Gould, you can't teach a guy to be that fast and that strong, guys that can score tries at this rate don't just spring up out of nowhere. When you think about the best players in the game, it's the halves, the hookers, the back rowers that often most quickly spring to mind, and certainly they often have more impact than the wings do, but guys with the try scoring ability of Uate don't just grow on trees. As a winger, he's the best in the world at what he does, and that demands recognition.

What if, instead of kicking it to them, we just kicked it to ourselves?

Hopefully everyone enjoys the All Star game tonight and check out tomorrow when we move on to number 25. Any comments or suggestions, feel free, I'm on Twitter @WellsNorthShore and always keen for a yarn about the greatest game of all.