St George Illawarra face a mighty challenge in taking on Brisbane this weekend, but with star prop Elsie Albert leading the way one thing is for certain – the Dragons enforcer won't be taking a backward step.
Through two rounds, Albert has been one of the best forwards in the NRLW. In the Dragons gritty win over Parramatta the Papua New Guinea international was best on ground as the Red V downed the Eels 10-0 in a torrid forward battle despite losing skipper Kezie Apps to injury in the days before the match.
Albert took the fight to Parramatta's star lock Simaima Taufa and won, running for 159 metres and leading St George Illawarra to one of the finest wins in the NRLW's short history.
The battles keep on coming for Albert – this week she'll go head-to-head with Brisbane's Millie Boyle, the best forward in the women's game, as the Dragons try and upset the high-flying Broncos.
Boyle has the NRLW's unstoppable force this year, running for over 200 metres in both of Brisbane's wins this year – only she and Taufua have gained more metres with ball in hand than Albert.
One can make the case that Boyle, along with Broncos fullback Tamika Upton, is the best player in the world but that won't stop Albert from ripping in. In the best tradition of Papua New Guinean rugby league, she's hard as a coffin nail and relishes the physical side of the game.
Originally, Albert was a boxer and a decent one at that. There's a story going around that she won a junior national heavyweight title because nobody would agree to fight her – it's a quality yarn, but according to Albert it's bending the truth.
"Nobody was in my weight category, that's why I didn't fight. I was about to go professional but my family didn't want me to," Albert said.
"I like physical sports and the physical side of those sports. That's what I love about rugby league. I love physicality, when I first saw that girls were playing footy I knew that's what I wanted to do."
Where Boyle's strength is her power and mobility, Albert's is her strength, determination and raw-boned running style, which has left many a hapless defender in her wake in both St George Illawarra's wins this season.
Albert has played a season with the Dragons before, back in 2020, but a visa mix-up almost had her banned from re-entering Australia for three years before intervention from the Dragons and the NSWRL helped smooth things over.
The postponement of the 2021 season has become something of a blessing in disguise, with Albert thriving over the summer and returning as one of the most improved players of the campaign so far.
"I get so excited. I came here six months ago and I was training hard because I thought to myself I couldn't let those six months go to waste. I wanted to give up sometimes but I wasn't going to let it go to waste, so I kept pushing it," Albert said.
"Sowie (Jamie Soward) is big on defence and he wants us to really work on it. If we aim up in defence we win the game, that's what he told us and that's what we did and that's what we'll keep doing."
