Just over a fortnight ago, Wigan Warriors eased past Wakefield Trinity in the Challenge Cup quarter-finals and Zak Hardaker enjoyed an outstanding game. He scored a try and struck up some fine combinations with England team-mate John Bateman.
After the game, Matty Peet waxed lyrical about two of the best players of their generation. “I think Zak and John have got a good connection,” said the Warriors head coach after the 36-6 win. “They play well together and enjoy each other’s company.”
Fast forward and a couple of weeks and Hardaker’s Wigan career lies in tatters. He was ushered out of the club last week and so there will be no appearance at Elland Road on Saturday, May 7, a missed moment for a boyhood Leeds United fan. It says much for Hardaker’s career path – on Cloud Nine one minute and then in a pit of despair the next.
Read more: Jon Wilkin accuses Zak Hardaker of getting what he wanted in Wigan Warriors exit
The full reasons behind his abrupt departure have yet to materialise and it should be remembered that Peet and team-mates such as Bateman have voiced their support for Hardaker at a difficult time. But to have your contract essentially ripped up tells its own story.
When you consider how Hardaker’s time at Leeds Rhinos and Castleford Tigers ended, there is a familiar pattern throughout.
He has played for three Super League clubs and has effectively been discarded by all of them. He was also thrown out of an England World Cup squad in 2013. Internal club disciplinary breaches, testing positive for cocaine, assaulting a student, drink-driving and homophobic abuse of a referee.
It is a lengthy old charge sheet. And then some.
Which makes Hardaker’s return to Headingley all the more intriguing – and some would say mystifying. Hardaker, of course, made his name in the blue and amber and established himself as one of the brightest young prospects in the game after signing from Featherstone Rovers as a teenager in 2010. A majestic rugby league player with the speed, skill and strength to outpace and outwit rival defences, Hardaker’s God-given talent has never been in doubt.
When the all-conquering Leeds side marched to a glorious treble in 2015, Hardaker was crowned Man of Steel. That season he provided so many moments of individual brilliance and long-range tries which served as a reminder of rugby league’s ability to enthral. After arriving back in Super League following a short stint in the NRL with Penrith, Hardaker was similarly sensational at Castleford. In 2017, he was narrowly pipped to the Man of Steel award by team-mate Luke Gale after another outstanding campaign at full-back.
Yet Hardaker has a propensity to repeatedly make bad decisions off the field. He has shot himself in the foot so many times now. Just weeks after Wigan had taken a chance on him following his sacking at Castleford, he was arrested after being caught drink-driving. He had drunk “two gins and six pints” and Wigan supremo Kris Radlinski said Hardaker had “pissed on the badge” with his actions.
Yet the Warriors stood by him and, after a spell in rehab, he became an important and well-liked member of the Wigan squad. Now they have finally had enough, he will be forced to reinvent himself elsewhere again. Hardaker is 30 and, while he may no longer possess the electric pace he once had, on his day he remains one of the best players in Super League.
As he showed that during what proved to be his last-ever game for Wigan in the Challenge Cup at Wakefield, he still has that same desire and competitive streak. While there are clearly issues in his personal life that Hardaker must face, the return to Leeds at least provides an opportunity to get back playing. The Rhinos have endured a disastrous campaign so far and have also been affected by injuries to players such as Richie Myler and Jack Walker.
Hardaker will provide options at full-back, centre and wing and will hope to recapture the hearts of the South Standers who once idolised him. His arrival at Headingley does not, however, quite tally with the kind of culture that new Rhinos head coach Rohan Smith espouses.
Smith is all about clean living, good habits and looking after yourself off the field – not drinking 10 pints in the pubs of Pontefract on a Saturday night. Smith is particularly big on working with and developing younger players, and there are certainly plenty of those at Leeds.
To put Hardaker within that environment is a risk, but these are desperate times as the Rhinos fight to avoid relegation. They clearly see signing him as a risk worth taking – and maybe he will prove them right. Certainly all eyes will be on Hardaker as he looks to once again salvage one of the most turbulent careers in Super League history.
