League: Peerless Hindmarsh redefines concept of workhorse

Kangaroo second rower Nathan Hindmarsh will be a short-priced favourite to top the tackle count against the Kiwis tonight. Kristian Dowling / Getty Images

There are few certainties for tonight's league test.

Australia are favourites, for sure. But against that are new lineups, rookies, weather uncertainty, the Kiwis' habit of winning when least expected, and Australia's tendency to be most vulnerable in opening encounters.

There is something you can dial in though. When they count up workrate statistics, Aussie second rower Nathan Hindmarsh will be on top.

In league word association, workhorse is Hindmarsh. First, check the scoreline. Then, check his tallies. Then wince, in admiration and awe.

The Eels' 104kg forward notched a record 63 tackles in a game against the Cowboys this year. SIXTY THREE.

"But I only did three hit-ups," he says.

The 27-year-old doesn't have a sleek physique. Then again, Louis Anderson is a New Zealand league running man and he's not exactly a whippet. But, as a point of comparison, a high mileage man like Anderson still averages under 30 tackles a game and the best of the rest of the NRL toilers hit the mid-30s mark. Even they are rare.

Back to Hindmarsh.

His floppy mop-top look is vaguely anti-establishment and hints at a lack of order. Yet he is a model worker, an endurance freak who defies modern trends and often plays 80 minutes. Hindmarsh wouldn't look out of place in a grunge band or clutching a surfboard. But he lives in representative league teams, just about owns the Parramatta player-of-the-year award, is the NRL second rower and fans' player of the season, and was second to Cameron Smith in the overall player award. That's a big medal drawer for the man with the big heart.

Hindmarsh comes from the southern New South Wales highlands, a place called Robertson, where the film Babe was made, and close to Bowral, Sir Don Bradman's hometown. Sacrilege maybe, to fling the Bradman name about like this, but Hindmarsh is now the Don of league endurance stats.

Yet until age 12, Hindmarsh was a slightly-overweight soccer player. After playing league for Moss Vale, he headed to Parramatta at the age of 16. He didn't have any league heroes as a kid, but supported the Bulldogs and liked their veteran playmaker Terry Lamb, a man whose game held together much longer than his body did.

When you're talking to Hindmarsh, you keep trying to find the key which unlocks the secret of his stamina. Instead, you get an apparently phlegmatic bloke who acknowledges his determination and the demands he places on himself, but who struggles to reveal why he is an extraordinary bloke on the field.

Clutching at straws, I even suggest that this marathon man bizzo is a reaction to his chubby childhood. Nothing doing.

Hindmarsh says: "I never look at stats after a game. I like to have a healthy workload but don't go checking at halftime and thinking I'd better do more hit-ups or tackles. I just go out there and work my butt off and that's it. I've always trained hard at every session and, as soon as I played as a kid I was doing the defence, so nothing much has changed."

Hindmarsh doesn't even have a mad sports diet, preferring the mantra of moderation - except in the off-season when he hits the takeaways. "If I notice that I'm starting to put on a bit of flab during the season I'll watch what I'm eating."

No clues there.

"A lot of it is attitude. But I don't mean to go out there and do all that work - it just happens for me."

Still searching.

"You know when you're buggered that you'll get a break sooner or later, through a scrum, a penalty or try. You just keep going until something like that happens. Even if you get the hook, by the time you sit down you're ready to go again. So I just try and wait for a break in play."

There you go kids. As easy as that.

Hindmarsh admits he now feels under pressure to keep coming up with the big numbers.

A couple of coaches have suggested he cuts down, and ups the quality.

"But I feel I have to do that work rate to have had a good game."

Hindmarsh keeps running, but not at the mouth. Willie Mason, Frank Pritchard and co spout forth at times, but Hindmarsh - who played the Anzac game after injury wrecked his 2005 Tri-Nations hopes - steers clear.

"I keep my mouth shut. That's the easiest way. It keeps you out of trouble," he says.

" If you're going to shoot your mouth off, then you're probably going to be one of the first blokes who gets targeted.

"Some people might enjoy that, but not me. Players do remember what's been said and that's why I tend to keep quiet."