NEWS
Lions go Stateside to sign up latest recruitBY NEIL GOFFET
31/01/2009 4:00:00 AM
FORWARD Ryan Mulligan will make history in the Newcastle competition this season when he becomes the first American rugby league player to join a local club.
The 22-year-old has signed with South Newcastle, and Lions officials hope it will lead to a regular exchange between the American National Rugby League and the Merewether-based club.
Standing 181 centimetres and weighing 100 kilograms, Mulligan is at home in the second row or front row and has played the past four seasons for the New York Knights.
He made his debut for the American Tomahawks national team last year in a lead-up game to their World Cup qualifying match against Samoa in London.
Mulligan did not get a start in the main game, when the Tomahawks were soundly beaten, but he got a taste of international rugby league and liked it.
"I guess the whole point in me coming over here is to get my game to as high a level as I can take it," Mulligan said.
"It was fantastic to get a taste of playing for the Tomahawks, and getting a regular spot in the national team is definitely a goal for me.
"I've had about three or four training sessions since I arrived here, and apart from the heat I'm really enjoying it.
"Obviously it's a lot more professional here, but that's the reason I came here in the first place."
Originally from New Jersey, Mulligan studied at Hamilton College in New York, where he lives while playing for the Knights.
Having left the US in minus-10 temperatures, Mulligan arrived in Newcastle last week during the sweltering 40-degree days.
A star lacrosse player at high school, Mulligan stumbled on league as a way of avoiding pre-season training for his chosen sport.
That was enough to convince him his immediate future was with the New York Knights.
The Newcastle Knights have a link with their New York counterparts and supply them with training gear and jerseys, and that is where it all started for Mulligan.
Former Knights chief executive Michael Hill was the link between the New York club and South Newcastle.
"We are hoping to have a relationship not only with the New York Knights, but with the whole American league," South Newcastle president Tim Butler said.
"We want their players to come over here and vice versa.
"We can hopefully set up an exchange between us and the American teams."
Having studied a pre-law degree at college, Mulligan will continue down that career path by working with UTR Law at The Junction during his time in Newcastle.
He will break new ground in the Newcastle competition. The only other American to play in Newcastle was former Knights winger Greg Smith.
Smith, who had a background in American football rather than league, played one first-grade game for the Knights in March 1999.
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