Incumbent Brisbane hooker Billy Walters is ready for one final shootout for the No.9 jersey and may the best man win.<\/p>\n
The race to be starting rake against Sydney Roosters in round one of the NRL on March 6 is reaching the finish line with Walters and Cory Paix neck and neck.<\/p>\n
Fellow Broncos hooker Tyson Smoothy is probably just behind that duo ahead of the club\u2019s final trial in Redcliffe against Canterbury on Saturday night.<\/p>\n
Paix was electric as the starting rake in the 50-12 win over Gold Coast in Toowoomba on Sunday on his way to scoring two tries.<\/p>\n
Walters, 31, started at five-eighth, where he set up an early try, before switching to hooker and topping the tackle count.<\/p>\n
After starting his career in the halves, he has been utilized exclusively as a hooker since round six of 2022 and was the starting No.9 in the 2023 grand finale.<\/p>\n
\u201cCory has come back fit and strong and really pushed me for that No.9 position. It is going to come down to who plays the best next week,\u201d Walters said.<\/p>\n
Walters has reinforced his ability as a playmaker in the pre-season and has divided his time between the halves and dummy-half. It is that versatility that will make him an even more valuable commodity as the season unfolds.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the NRL you can\u2019t just float between positions. You\u2019ve got to rep in the positions and do time in a spot otherwise you get found out,\u201d Walters said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI did a fair bit of work in the pre-season at both No.6 and No.9. It was a good step today and hopefully I can continue that if I need to go there again.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am hoping (coach Michael Maguire) is going to take two hookers in the 17 into round one. I will be happy to be in the team anywhere, whether that is 6, 9 or 14. I just love playing for the Broncos.\u201d<\/p>\n
Paix did not play NRL in 2024 but honed his craft at Wynnum-Manly in the Queensland Cup. His stocks have risen since the arrival of Maguire, who values his work ethic and speed from dummy-half with the ball.<\/p>\n
\u201cQueensland Cup is no slouch competition and to go back and play 80 minutes (in 2024) was really pleasing for me to do week-in and week-out,\u201d said Paix, adding his father had taught him \u201cno matter what jersey you wear, you do it to the best of your ability\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m pretty confident I can play football \u2013 I just needed to be given a chance,\u201d he said. \u201cI will keep chipping way.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for his round one hopes, the 25-year-old was typically taking nothing for granted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Incumbent Brisbane hooker Billy Walters is ready for one final shootout for the No.9 jersey and may the best man win. The race to be starting rake against Sydney Roosters in round one of the NRL on March 6 is reaching the finish line with Walters and Cory Paix neck and neck. Fellow Broncos hooker […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":721,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[19,49],"class_list":["post-719","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-featured","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=719"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":720,"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719\/revisions\/720"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/futuredesignteam.in\/client\/politicus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}