On this week’s episode of Behind the Roar we chat to the Fainu brothers who last weekend became the first trio of brothers to play NRL together for Wests Tigers.
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It’s not often three brothers all get to play NRL, yet alone at the same time, and in the same team. So rare in fact, only ten times have three or more brothers played together in the same team in the past 100 years.
Last weekend Latu, Samuela and Sione Fainu created a slice of history when they suited up together against the Rabbitohs in Gosford, and they’ll be at it again on Friday against the Warriors in Auckland.
Two of them made their NRL debut with Wests Tigers this season, while the other made his NRL debut against Wests Tigers last season.
In an odd twist of fate, Latu and Sione played their very first NRL game against the same opposition, at the very same venue, yet some seven weeks apart.
We talk footy, family, and a whole lot more. Three good young men who differ in shape, size and personality, but who share the strongest of bonds as brothers.
Here's a little more on the brotherly ties in rugby league, thanks largely to the game’s doyen of digits, David Middleton.
The record is four brothers in the one team, and this has happened twice. First were the Norman brothers (Ray, Roy, Rex and Bernard) who played for Annandale in 1910.
About a century later the Burgess boys (Luke, Sam, George and Tom) lined up together for the Rabbitohs on six occasions.
When the Fainu boys ran out against the Bunnies last weekend, they became just the eighth trio of bros to play together in the same team.
The Trbojevic boys at Manly (Jake, Tom and Ben) are the other current brotherly trio in the NRL, but if we go back further there are another six sets of three.
Sione, Peter and Pat Mata’utia all played for Newcastle Knights on the one occasion in Round 25, 2016.
There was the Hughes clan at Canterbury (Garry, Mark and Graeme) and of course the Mortimers (Steve, Peter and Chris) in that great Bulldogs team in the 80’s.
Then a second generation of Hughes boys (Glen, Steven and Corey) would also play together for the Bulldogs, their final game together was in 2001.
Around about the same time three Walkers (Ben, Shane and Chris) were doing their thing at the Broncos, and if we go way back to 1926 there were three Johnson brothers (Harold, Cec and Jim) playing for North Sydney Bears.
