Michael Morgan

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Cowboy #214

Michael Morgan first pulled on a Cowboys jersey in round one of the 2009 Toyota Cup season, playing his first three games in the NYC at hooker before finding a home in the halves.

After playing 19 games in 2009, he made another 19 Toyota Cup appearances in 2010 either side of his NRL debut as an 18-year-old in round nine.

Morgan ended up with 60 matches on his NYC record, including some as stand-in captain and the 2011 Grand Final against the NZ Warriors, and he had also turned out in eight NRL games by the end of 2011.

A hat-trick in the home elimination final against the Brisbane Broncos was the highlight of his 2012 campaign, which featured another 11 NRL matches.

Morgan was included in the Queensland Emerging Origin squad for the first time for 2013 and scored a vital try for the Mackay Cutters in their Intrust Super Cup Grand Final win against Easts.

Selection in the Kangaroos’ Four Nations train-on squad and the Australian Prime Minister’s XIII showed just how far Morgan came in season 2014.

Thrown into the fullback role, he was a revelation and ended up playing all 26 matches in the No.1 jersey, missing his only minutes when he came off with concussion in the elimination final against Brisbane.

Morgan began the 2015 season in the fullback position once again, but returned to the halves in round 3 and went on to have his best season to date, forming a lethal halves combination with Johnathan Thurston.

He scored an impressive 15 tries in his 23 matches, the most tries for a half in the NRL in 2015, and also managed 11 offloads, 20 line breaks and an average of 84 running metres, and was rewarded with a nomination for five-eighth of the year, along with his first premiership.

Morgan also got his first taste of state representative football in 2015, filling in as Queensland’s bench utility in game one of the State of Origin series.

He held his position in the side for the remaining two games and scored a try in Queensland’s 52-6 victory in the decider at Suncorp Stadium.

In 2016, the gifted footballer produced another consistent season, punctuated by moments of brilliance, and missed just five club games through injury and Origin duty.

Morgan debuted for Australia in the May Test and was also part of the Kangaroos squad to contest the 2016 Four Nations tournament.

The 2017 NRL season – or more to the pointed, the back half of it – was all about Michael Morgan.

Having retained his Australian jersey for the annual May Test against the Kiwis, Morgan was looking for more consistency in his game as the Cowboys battled a rising injury toll.

When the Cowboys lost talismanic co-captain Johnathan Thurston for the remainder of the season following the second State of Origin match in June, Morgan took on the mantle of the team’s chief playmaker.

Fresh from a star turn in the Origin series, Morgan made every post a winner in the back half of 2018, combining with mid-season recruit Te Maire Martin to lead the Cowboys all the way to an unlikely grand final berth against the Storm.

Morgan ended up finishing second in Dally M Medal voting to Storm, Queensland and Australian skipper Cameron Smith, and second behind teammate Jason Taumalolo in the Cowboys’ Paul Bowman Medal for player of the year. He and Taumalolo shared the coveted peer-voted Players’ Player award.

Playing in the unfamiliar role of halfback, Morgan shone week-in, week-out, with his vastly improved kicking game a standout feature of his play.

The stellar season was rewarded with selection at five-eighth in the Kangaroos team to contest the 2017 Rugby League World Cup, with the gifted 25-year-old playing in two of the Roos’ opening three pool games.

Morgan suffered an abdominal injury late in the pre-season, which forced him out of Rounds 1 and 2. He returned for the blockbuster clash with the Storm in Round 3, but admitted he would likely have to battle through pain for the rest of the season.

With the retirement of club legend Johnathan Thurston, Morgan will officially take over as the main playmaker for the Cowboys in 2019.

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Favourite movie: Wedding Crashers
Favourite athlete growing up: Darren Lockyer
If you could eat one meal for the rest of your life, what would it be?: Brownie and ice cream
Most ridiculous fact you know: Gold fish aren’t real gold
First CD: So Fresh 2000
Event you would most like to attend: Conor McGregor fight
One superpower: Be able to fly
Pre-game meal: Whatever I feel like on the day
Favourite joke: What’d the cheese say when it looked in the mirror? Haloumi