Eleven-year-old Lucca Grego is the first boy selected in 16 years from Altona Primary School to play in a national sporting championship.
He will be playing with the under-12 Victorian rugby league team at this year’s national championships.
He started playing the sport at age four in Brisbane, before moving to Melbourne and joining the Altona Roosters.
“One of my dreams is to become a professional rugby league player and just be an inspiration to little kids when I’m older,” Grego said.
Grego has a few role models but singles out Melbourne Storm captain Cameron Smith as “one of the best players in the league, currently”.
The School Sport Australia Rugby League Championships will be held in Adelaide in August.
“The competition will be pretty hard,” Grego said. “We’ll be playing the best of the best.
“I’ll just go out there and have fun.”
Grego could be following in the footsteps of rugby league star Gareth Widdop, 29, captain of the St George Illawarra Dragons who attended Bayside Secondary College and also played for Altona Roosters.