HAMILTON coach Marty Berry was taken aback the first time he watched Hawks captain Angus Brown shrug out of a tackle by a defender twice the centre's size and burst down the field.
"He is pretty strong for a little fella," said Berry, a former All Black in his second year in charge of the Hawks.
"He is a bit like Christian Cullen the amount of tackles he can break. I didn't think I would come across someone like that.
"He is incredibly fit and just keeps going. He is non-stop."
Brown has been punching above his weight since joining the Hawks in 2018 after returning from Sydney, where he went to school and then played a season in colts at Easts.
"As a kid I was tiny," Brown said. "You had to avoid tacklers somehow. Same in defence, you have to learn to get players down. Some of the bigger boys were almost men at age 12."
Brown played the 2020 season with the Hunter Wildfires in the Shute Shield after the Hunter Rugby Union competition was cancelled due to COVID.
"It helped my game playing at that higher level," Brown said. "Players in the Shute Shield are so much faster and a lot of them are quite large as well."
The 24-year-old centre heads to Ireland at the end of the Hawks' campaign.
"I'm playing for Malahide, which is about 20 minutes north of Dublin," he said. "The rugby is a similar level to here. Nothing too extreme. It's something I have always wanted to do."
Brown was due to fly out on September 24, which is now HRU grand final day after the first weekend of the finals was pushed back due to wild weather. Malahide's season starts on October 1.
The Hawks aren't in the decider yet. They meet Wanderers in the preliminary final on Saturday, but Brown had to plan ahead.
"There is another flight out on the Sunday and I will have to take that," Brown said. "The IRFU requires you to be there at least a week before the competition starts. I have already been granted a day exemption."
Hamilton have played Wanderers in four of the past five grand finals since 2015 - 2020 was cancelled due to COVID-19 and the pandemic halted the 2021 season early.
"A few people wrote Wanderers off at one stage but they have fought back into it and are always tough," Brown said. "These are the games you play for - against the top teams. You get the most enjoyment out of the contest."
Brown will match up against Dillon Rowney, who like the Hamilton centre is in career-best form.
But Berry has no doubts that Brown will rise to the occasion.
"I think Dillon Rowney will have a job to do, not the other way around," Berry said.
