Breaking Bread: Mitchell Pearce, Newcastle Knights halfback

Diners in The Depot on Darby lift their gaze from their meals to the young man on the other side of the window, and they begin talking to each other in hushed voices.

Pearce himself doesn’t seem to notice the axis shift in the room as he walks in. After all, the 29-year-old has had the public eye fixed on him since he was a teenager, occasionally for unwanted reasons, but mostly because of his talent as a rugby league player.    

Having moved from Sydney to a smaller, footy-mad city to be the lynchpin in the Newcastle Knights’ rebuild, Mitchell Pearce has the most famous face in town.

Yet it is a relaxed face, remarkably unscarred by more than a decade of playing professional rugby league, and often wearing an easy smile.

Pearce possesses the face of a young man in a good place, especially since he is once more on the field after missing nine games with a torn pectoral muscle. The team, the city, and, above all, the halfback himself are relieved he’s out there again. Once more, the Knights are winning, and Pearce is happy.

“It was frustrating being on the sidelines,” he says, explaining this was the first major injury of his professional career. “I was in some pretty bad moods, drove my missus up the wall a bit.”

Yet Pearce has used the time to not only heal the wound but to reflect.  

“To be honest, in a weird way, I was having a lot of experiences when I was out injured,” he says. “It’s the first time I’ve sat down and wasn’t playing, which made me think a lot about what I am without footy.

“It was almost like it happened for a bit of a reason. It just made me think about if I didn’t have footy, what would I be doing? I did a bit of soul searching. But I didn’t come up with too many answers.”

EVEN before Mitchell Pearce came into the world, it was almost destiny that rugby league would hold the answers to his life.

He is the son of Balmain Tigers legend Wayne Pearce. Mitchell was born in 1989, five months before his father would lead the Tigers into the grand final against the Canberra Raiders, who won the match.

“Mum [Terri] said I was there,” smiles Mitchell.

Wayne Pearce retired in 1990, so his son holds no memories of watching him play.

However, when Wayne progressed to a coaching career with the Tigers, as well as with the NSW State of Origin team, his son would follow him to training and into the sheds. Young Mitchell even ventured onto the field as a ball boy.

Yet Mitchell’s parents held him back from playing in a rugby league team until he was 10.

“I think Dad and Mum just wanted me to make up my own mind about footy,” Pearce recalls. “Obviously with Dad playing, they wanted me to work out if I liked it.

“Dad pushed me into soccer at the start.” 

Pearce is the middle child; he has an older sister, Hannah, and a younger sister, Tatum: “I think I’m the spoilt one. I think the girls would say that. I don’t say that! I think I’m a Mummy’s boy, that’s for sure. I’m the only boy, so I can’t do any wrong by Mum.

“So I put my dramas I’ve had down to her,” he says through a grin, making it clear he’s joking. “Spoiling me at home! Taking no responsibility!”  

As a kid, Mitchell would kick the footy in the backyard, not with his two sisters but a couple of boys from the neighbourhood, Kieran and Liam Foran. All three would graduate to the NRL.

“They were my best mates growing up,” Pearce says. “I was lucky growing up in a family with two girls, but I regard those boys as my brothers growing up.”

When Mitchell began playing in junior rugby league teams, he quickly progressed.

He had inherited his father’s talent and, in time, his nickname: Junior. Although there are variations for the son; some team-mates have called Mitchell Pearce “Junior Junior”, or “Ju Ju”.

Yet as a teenager and into the early stages of his NRL career, Mitchell wanted to be recognised for who he was, and what he was capable of, not simply as Wayne Pearce’s son.

“The extra stories and attention that comes with having a famous Dad didn’t sit well with me,” he concedes.

“I probably resented that a bit. Not resented him, but I probably rebelled a bit against it. I pushed him away a few times. I probably just tried to break out of the shadow a bit.

“It may have been in my own head, how I perceived it, but it was definitely a burden for a while.”

Pearce recounts one incident at the gym. As a teenager, he would train with his father: “I was a skinny little halfback, but I was such a competitor and he was too, and I’d try and go with him. 

“I remember one day, I couldn’t keep up with him and spitting the dummy a few times... I laugh about that a bit, because in hindsight I was trying to take on a bit of a legend, I think.”

These days, Pearce’s relationship with his father is very strong, saying, “We’re really good mates, and we can talk like men now.” 

During his teenage years, Mitchell Pearce competed in athletics, making national level, but he didn’t enjoy being alone on the track. He much preferred the camaraderie of a team.

He found his home, and his future, on the rugby league field.

By his mid-teens, Pearce was an Australian schoolboy representative player and was promoted to captain of the team.

“That’s when I started to believe I could make a career out of it - or at least try and crack the NRL,” recalls Pearce. Not that he had a career plan B in mind: “Nothing. I probably put all my eggs into one basket. It was just always footy for me, to be honest.”

The gamble paid off. He earned a contract with the Sydney Roosters and in 2007, aged just 17, he ran out in the famous tricolours. 

“There’s no doubt in hindsight, I was a bit young that first year,” he says. “I was only 17, I was quite skinny. Nowhere as big as I am now.”

Still, his star kept ascending. By the following season, Pearce was not only a fixture in the Roosters’ first-grade side, the teenager was selected for NSW in the third match of the State of Origin series. 

Pearce has played 18 Origin matches. But, again, he has felt he was too young when he first slipped on a Blues jersey. 

With age and experience, Pearce explains, he has learnt to trust his instincts, and that has made him a better player – and person.

“It’s probably something that if I had my career again, I’d do more,” he says.

“Whenever I’ve played my best footy and made my best decisions, I’ve always trusted my instinct. I think we all do.”

For more than a decade, Mitchell Pearce was a key playmaker for the Roosters. So he was synonymous with one of the most successful and richest clubs in the competition. 

With its roots in the flashy Eastern Suburbs of Sydney, the Roosters are also among the most derided by other clubs’ fans, who tenaciously hang onto the belief that rugby league is still a working-class sport. Which meant that as one of their highest-profile players, Pearce also copped a lot of flak.

Not that he let the slings and arrows wound his view of the club; Pearce was proud to be a Rooster.  

“When I was inside, there were always good coaches, quality rep players, and a really tough environment, training hard, a real winning culture,” he explains. “That’s what I was exposed to at the Roosters.”

“I loved the Roosters. I had a great time there.

“I grew from a boy to a 28-year-old, when I left. A lot goes on in that time.”

Indeed, it does. 

Pearce experienced the jubilation of playing in the Sydney Roosters’ 2013 premiership-winning side. And he endured humiliation and self-disgust due to a couple of alcohol-fuelled off-field incidents.

The most notorious was in early 2016, when video footage of Pearce simulating a lewd act with a dog at an Australia Day party was aired. The nation was appalled, and it seemed as though Pearce had not only trashed his reputation but his career.

He publicly apologised for his “unacceptable” behaviour, acknowledged he had a “problem with alcohol” and flew to Thailand to undertake a rehabilitation program.

As he sips on an orange and apple juice, Mitchell Pearce doesn’t shy away from discussing how that scandal impacted on him - and how he has changed because of it.   

“Before that video, I wasn’t in the happiest place,” Pearce explains. “I’d had a girlfriend for a long time, broke up with her. The same thing as what a lot of young boys go through.”

“When all the video went down, I didn’t know ... I was sort of lost for a while. 

I always loved a good time. Footy’s always been my number one priority. But alcohol and a good time, and chasing that temptation, have always been something that ... For me, there’s no doubt I had a bit of ratbag in me, and I’ve always enjoyed enjoying myself, I suppose. And it was getting me into a bit of trouble.

“When I was in rehab, I didn’t know what I was there for at the time. I didn’t think I was an alcoholic, or anything like that.”

But, I counter, you said at the time you had a problem with alcohol.

“Alcohol’s always got me in trouble,” Pearce says. “If it wasn’t a public drama, there was always something that was going to happen whenever I was around alcohol and drinking. I didn’t have a complete grip on it. And I think, obviously, being a footballer and having a profile, it gets magnified as well.”

His mother had accompanied him to Thailand, but Pearce was on his own in the rehab facility. While a firestorm raged back home, with public opinion wrestling with whether he should be kicked out of the game, Pearce had surrendered his mobile phone and initially had no communication with the outside world, as he looked deep within himself.   

“It was really scary at first,” he recalls. “The first week I didn’t know what I was doing there, didn’t know what was going to happen back home. So it was a pretty emotional time for the first week. A lot of things going through your head, letting people down, that sort of stuff, but … it was one of the best things I’ve ever done.

“I learnt a lot about responsibility when I went over to the rehab. Taking responsibility for your life, and where things have gone wrong for you. 

“It was just a really good eye-opener, and mixing with other people and hearing some deep stories, people opening up to you about some really heavy stuff.

“I think when I’m 80 and I look back, that was a real turning point in my life.”

The experience, he says, clarified who and what was important in his life. Or, as Pearce explains: “It tightened everything up a little bit. Probably I tried to grow up into a bit better man really.”

Through that process, I ask, what became clear about his priorities.

“Family’s number one,” he replies. “Family and close friends are number one for me. 

“Happiness is probably on par with that. Happiness and inner peace.

“And obviously doing what you love, which is footy for me.

“Those were the three things that made sense. They’re the three things I focus a lot of my energy onto now.

“In that period, I got back to a lot of gratitude.”

What’s more, Pearce looks back with gratitude on that period, as it impelled him to take time out and focus on his well-being.

“I think everyone could do with some slowing down sometimes, and some self-assessment,” he asserts.

“I think we all need to go through it at one point. For me, that’s the biggest thing I’ve taken out of that experience, and try and invest into my life now, it’s a lot about gratitude, positive thinking, and hanging with good people, family, and just doing what you love. I think life’s too short not to.”

These days, Pearce will have an alcoholic drink, but “I just try and stay on top of it”. He also continues to slow down and assess. He meditates every morning and evening.

“I’ve never been a religious person, but I’m quite into the spiritual side of energies. I read a lot of stuff on Buddhism while I was away, and I still follow that. For me, it just gives you a lot more peace and gives you a bit more clarity in the way I think. It’s become a bit of a lifestyle thing for me now.

“With maturity, I’ve started to think a bit more clearly with what works. And having a positive outlook and having a routine in place to allow yourself to live that clear, balanced life. For me, that’s how it seems to work.”

Mitchell Pearce paid a heavy price for his behaviour in 2016, being fined and suspended for eight NRL matches. But he was allowed to play on, and in a Roosters jersey. Just as he cherished his blood family, Pearce was grateful to be back among his team-mates, his football family.

But late last year, the man who, through bitter experience, had been reminded of the importance of family and belonging collided with the ruthless realities of big business. 

The Roosters signed Melbourne Storm halfback and playmaker Cooper Cronk. It seemed as though Mitchell Pearce was becoming a feather duster.

“For me, that’s what probably pissed me off more than anything about the Roosters, just the way it unfolded,” Pearce reflects.