A date with a different 'Wally': Perese's surprise meeting with 'King ...

When Izaia Perese was a naughty schoolboy, it took a surprise meeting with ‘The King’ and Wallabies icon Andrew Slack to nudge him on to the right track.

The moment is so indelibly printed in his mind that Perese never has trouble rewinding to his 12-year-old self.

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When someone shows belief in you, it is a powerful potion just as coach Eddie Jones is doing with the biggest Wallabies assignment of Perese’s chequered Rugby career.

Being picked at outside centre to face the All Blacks has always been the stage on which Perese has wanted to play.

He’s done a good job of derailing himself at times but he’s finally made it and to the Melbourne Cricket Ground no less.

The leg drive and willpower that pinballs him through much bigger opponents has always been his calling card.

It’s the reason the NSW Waratahs are always at their best when Perese is skittling would-be tacklers and flipping his backhanded offloads.

So how exactly did rugby league legend Wally Lewis and Slack show him the rewards of pulling his wild young head in? 

It was a classic deal struck by a caring schoolteacher which showed the young Perese not everyone was indifferent about him failing.

Recognition by the Wallabies may be the pinnacle for Perese in 2023 but it was different for a kid at Brisbane’s Aspley State School.  

Home life was unsettled and so was Perese in Grade Seven. Deputy principal Margaret McKinnon struck on a novel ploy to keep the rogue youngster in check.

“I was a bit of a naughty boy. I played up a bit, talked in class, behavioural things, you know,” Perese confessed.

“I had one lovely teacher and I remember her saying…’you are a good footy player but if you keep playing up you won’t go far’. She also made this promise with me…’if you’re good for the rest of school, I’ve got two good friends who’d love to meet you’. 

“I still had a few hiccups but she was an awesome lady who saw good in me. Anyway, it comes to the end of term and I get called to her office, maybe a goodbye to end my time at the school. Wally Lewis and Andrew Slack are both just standing there with smiles on their faces.”

Perese always has a ready grin or a line. Not for that split-second. “I still remember it to this day and the emotions of being taken aback. It was a surreal moment,” Perese said. 

Over time, Perese processed a fuller meaning to that meeting and the schoolteacher’s wonderful ploy. 

“That was the very start of someone seeing potential and believing in me,” Perese said. “It definitely boosted the fire inside me. Not everyone is against me, not everyone wants to see me fail. There are people who see the light in me. To the people who do, I always want to make them proud.”

Perese had still to play his first match for the Queensland Reds in 2017 when a group of Vintage Reds met with the players in the dressing room at Suncorp Stadium on a training day.

Perese spotted Slack and told him the story of inspiration. It’s fair to say it was the Wallabies skipper of the 1980s who was taken aback this time because he didn't recognise the face.

“Making them proud” is still a central theme with Perese. Most of all, it’s now his partner and their three young kids Mackenzie, Ardie and Rocco.

At 26, that’s a hectic life even without Rugby. As is so often the case, it has taken him plenty of rollercoaster years to become the star he was tipped to be overnight.

He made two Wallabies tours as a training squad member before he impatiently decided on a leap to rugby league.

He played two games for the Brisbane Broncos but off-field stupidity left his career in limbo. 

He was lucky to escape a conviction and luckier still that the Waratahs were prepared to offer him a lifeline in 2021.

“The journey I’ve been through is sort of the journey I had to take. I wouldn’t take it back because I wouldn’t be the man I am today without it,” Perese said.

Many of those lessons have been tough. Only seeing his career on the brink and how he’s clawed it back as a more mature person has enabled him to say this.

His second chance in Rugby has, potentially, its biggest pay-off still ahead. Many thought that when he faced England at Suncorp Stadium 12 months ago in the longest of his three Test cameos.

Disaster. His awkward landing after catching a chip kick after half-time floored him with a ruptured patella tendon.

How much he needs his leg strength was obvious with his muted start to Super Rugby Pacific this year.

When he got the miles in his legs, the pistons started pumping again.   

At his best that is 2022 at Leichhardt Oval. When the Waratahs stunned the Crusaders 24-21 in Sydney last year, Perese was up to his ears in it.

He shed one defender and produced a trademark out-the-back-of-the-hand offload through two more would-be defenders to set up a key try for Mark Nawaqanitawase.

Jones has always been up front that he’s newly learning as much about his players as they are about him, his game style, his non-negotiables.

He’s wanted to see players wrestling for the chance to go to the Rugby World Cup not assuming a seat on the plane.

“When he came into (first) camp in June he was probably just making the squad (of 34). 

“He’s really elevated himself by training really well, he’s got a great attitude to learn and is impressing us all round,” Jones said of Perese.

The Perese mentality lends to a cricket parallel.

“He wants to go, mate. He’s off the long run, he’s banging it in short and not waiting for anyone to tell him what to do,” Jones said. “That’s the sort of player we want.”

The 12-year-old Perese didn’t want to let down the schoolteacher who showed faith in him. 

You strongly suspect he doesn’t want to let down the Wallabies coach who has shown him the same regard.