Lads from Stretford tend to be consumed by football in general and Manchester United especially. Growing up, Kallum Watkins’s passion was for rugby league and the club now known as Salford Red Devils.
Rather than Cristiano Ronaldo, Ryan Giggs and Ruud van Nistelrooy, Watkins had his own trio of heroes as a ball boy at Salford’s old ground at the Willows.
“Stuart Littler, Gary Broadbent and Malcolm Alker, they were the players I liked to watch and were a big influence on what I wanted to do,” Watkins said. “It was about being a professional rugby league player. It didn’t matter where it was.”
His father’s love of watching league translated into his son playing at eight for Langworthy Reds in Salford and later for Latchford Albion in Warrington after the family moved to Altrincham. There are parallels with another Salfordian who made the cross-Pennine move to Leeds Rhinos as a 16-year-old; if Watkins can make the sort of impact Adrian Morley has in his 21-year career, he will be some talent.
The portents are already good for a classy three-quarter and finisher, who has attracted comparisons with Greg Inglis, the outstanding centre of his generation and scourge of England for Australia for a decade.
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Although flattered, the grounded Watkins is not yet convinced. “I’m nowhere near where GI [Inglis] is, he’s a freak of nature,” he said. “But I aim to continue improving and building on the run of games after the injuries I had in my younger years. Keep going, keep progressing, there are a lot of things I need to work on.”
As the mighty Leeds triumvirate of Kevin Sinfield, Jamie Peacock and Kylie Leuluai prepare to bow out in October, Watkins, at 24, is in the vanguard of senior professionals ready to carry the Rhinos forward, but with the specific aim of monopolising domestic silverware in 2015, before part of the club’s “golden generation” leave.
The first task in the quest to win three trophies comes in the Ladbrokes Challenge Cup final, with Leeds the overwhelming favourites against Hull Kingston Rovers on Saturday at Wembley. Watkins and his team-mates finally ended a run of six finals defeats last year, defeating Castleford Tigers to win the sport’s oldest competition after a 15-year lull.
“We’d been been to Wembley so many times and not performed,” he said, “but last year we set out our plan to do it right, stuck to it and got the rewards. The monkey’s off our backs, except the pressure is on to win it again.”
Watkins, whose first two of 99 career tries came as a 17-year-old in a defeat of Bradford Bulls at the 2008 Magic Weekend, later went through two years of agonies with separate knee injuries. For four seasons he has been a bedrock of the team, now inside Tom Briscoe, his fellow England international, on the wing.
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Peacock, the veteran Leeds prop, is among those tipping Watkins for the Man of Steel award at the end of the year.
“I’ve been playing well in a good team,” Watkins said. “JP’s a leader of men, a warrior as a person and a player, so to hear him say that was flattering and special. He’s the guy you look up to.
“All three [Sinfield, Peacock and Leuluai] leaving want the best for the team. It’s a huge privilege to play alongside them, As a kid, they were the ones you saw being successful on TV. We’ll miss them, but they’ve laid the platform for the rest of us to continue their work and progress the club as far as possible.”
As for his own future, Watkins signed a five-year contract extension in February, although he does not discount possibly following Morley’s example again in moving to the NRL in Australia. “Players like him, the Burgess boys, it’s been fantastic for them there,” he said. “It’s something I can look at. Right now, I’m happy where I am.”