Brodie Croft has got all attributes to be one of Super League’s best players

Salford full-back Ryan Brierley has urged rugby league fans in the UK to really embrace the club’s star signing Brodie Croft.

Australian half-back Croft scored on his first appearance in a Salford shirt on Saturday. The Red Devils eased past League 1 neighbours Swinton 48-12 at the AJ Bell Stadium in their annual pre-season friendly.

Croft has joined Salford on a two-year deal. He has made 65 NRL appearances for Melbourne Storm and Brisbane Broncos.

The 24-year-old impressed on his unofficial debut for the Red Devils. His team-mate Brierley wants fans to welcome him with open arms – just like they did when former Man of Steel Jackson Hastings arrived back in 2018.

Brierley, 29, said: “Brodie is still a young kid. I always see myself as looking up to him but he is a kid so when he’s asking me questions I’m like ‘I don’t know, you know the answer!’ It has been really good.

“Everyone knows about Sneydy (Marc Sneyd), we’ve watched him for years. He has got a good brain and a wand of a left foot. But Brodie particularly, like what you guys did with Jackson (Hastings), embrace him and enjoy his style of play.

“I think he has been built up to be this kind of Cooper Cronk-style dominant half-back but that’s not him. He is a really exciting runner of the ball and with the way he thinks, he wants to entertain. He wants to run, he’s fast, he’s smart and he’s tough defensively so I think we should all embrace him and look after him over here. That would be really good for him.”

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Brodie Croft tipped for Super League success

Croft won the World Club Challenge with Melbourne in 2018 and played for Storm in the NRL Grand Final that year. In 2019, he won representative honours with the Junior Kangaroos.

Brierley believes Croft is more than capable of being one of the best players in Super League this season.

He added: “I’m a rugby nerd so I read a lot of stuff you guys put out and not so much you guys, but the NRL journalists absolutely battered him. I know you guys are not like that so that’s why I want you to really embrace that. I think he deserves that.

“He is over here with his young family and he has got all the attributes to be one of the best players in the league. If we all jump around him and give him a bit of a cuddle I think we’ll see him light up Super League and that’d be nice. He has got all the attributes to really kick on and we are lucky to have him.”

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“It is only going to take my game to a new level”

Like Croft, Brierley is a new face at the Salford club ahead of the new season. The Scotland international has joined his boyhood club on a two-year deal from Leigh, who suffered relegation from Super League last season.

Brierley is enjoying working alongside Croft and Marc Sneyd in the halves; and believes they are helping improve him as a player.

He laughed: “We’ve had a lot of dialogue with us being three little rugby nerds! I was speaking to Brodie on the field the other day for an hour just about one play, but I like it.

“They think so deep about rugby league in certain things, so it is only going to take my game to a new level. I’m loving coming to training everyday learning from those two.

“I said to Brodie the other day that it is not just Brodie you learn from, you learn from those who Brodie has learnt from. You are talking Cameron Smith, Cooper Cronk and Billy Slater so when Brodie tells me Billy Slater recommends this, then you are going to listen, aren’t you? It is not just Brodie and Sneydy, it is the players they’ve played with and what they’ve learnt throughout their careers.”

READ MORE: Salford coach Paul Rowley wants Brodie Croft to enjoy time at the club