You don’t need to mention that pass – Cody Walker lives with it every day, but isn’t going to let one mistake define his career.
Walker’s ill-timed cut-out ball, which was intercepted by Panthers winger Stephen Crichton for a runaway try, was a massive turning point in last year’s grand final. Had he seen the Penrith winger creeping out and put a little less power on it, Dane Gagai would likely have gone through a hole. Had he thrown the pass with a bit more gusto, Alex Johnston had a free passage to streak down the sideline.
Instead, it found its way to Crichton, Penrith won, and the rest is history.
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But as South Sydney teammate Mark Nicholls pointed out, Walker was a major reason why the game was close at that point.
“To be honest, without Cody and Cam in that game, we don’t get anywhere near where we did – so nothing needed to be said [about the intercept],” Nicholls said.
Walker is coming off the best season of his life – his gaudy try and line break involvement numbers would have looked even more eye-popping if not for being overshadowed by Tom Trbojevic’s Dally M-winning campaign – but he’s focused on not just improving himself, but others around him.
“We didn’t have all these discussions based around what happened or anything like that,” the five-eighth told Wide World of Sports.
“It’s not about changing the whole game plan and starting with a clean slate, it’s about finding little pockets in the game where we can get better.
“It’s not a nice feeling knowing that we lost, it’s quite devastating – but one of the great things in life is that if you get knocked down you can get back up – and my career’s been a great example of that.”
Walker’s off-field issues earlier in his career are well documented, and he views himself as the ultimate example of always looking forward.
He could have let a string of events prevent him from reaching the NRL, but instead made his debut back in 2016 – at the ripe old age of 26.
“You can’t change the past so why let yourself dwell on it?” he said.
Walker will be joined in the halves by new halfback Lachlan Ilias, after Adam Reynolds’ much-publicised move to the Broncos.
“He’s had a great pre-season, he’s a great young kid with a great temperament and kicking game, really strong in the gym – so now it’s just about continuing to work hard,” Walker said.
It’s not exactly a bad way to learn your craft – coming into a spine that features Latrell Mitchell, Walker, and Damien Cook.
“We’re always teaching him things that he needs to do, and one of his great qualities is that he’s willing to learn and listen. We’re really looking forward to where his development goes.”
There’s almost a sense of paternal pride from Walker when he talks about just how much some of the young guns in the squad have come along in the past few seasons.
“That’s the great thing about our squad – we’ve got guys who are well-established first graders now who only came in in the past couple of years. Keaon Koloamatangi and Campbell Graham are great examples of that,” Walker said.
But it’s a now-departed alumni of that patented Souths left edge that’s still having an influence around Redfern.
“Dane Gagai worked on his game religiously – and the one thing you’ll see in this pre-season is Campbell Graham, Jaxson Paulo, Taane Milne doing the same things because they saw Gags doing them.
“It’s obviously a big loss for us but his mindset around wanting to get better was second-to-none and these guys have picked that up.”
But what about his old halves partner?
“I’ve deleted his number already,” Walker jokes.
“We’ve had some friendly banter over the past couple of months.”
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