Millie Elliott’s shot at Lazarus-like rugby league feat

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Millie Elliott’s shot at Lazarus-like rugby league feat

Millie Elliott is trying to shift focus from the chance to write her name in the rugby league history books alongside fellow champion prop Glenn Lazarus.

If the Sydney Roosters beat Cronulla in Sunday’s grand final, front-rower Elliott will become the first player in the NRLW’s short history to win deciders at three separate clubs.

Lazarus became the first and only men’s player to achieve that feat when he captained Melbourne to a famous victory in the 1999 grand final – his last premiership game.

The front-rower nicknamed ‘The Brick With Eyes’ had previously won two premierships each with Canberra (1989, 1990) and Brisbane (1992, 1993) during a five-year run playing in every decider.

Elliott has been similarly influential, first as a linchpin of Brisbane’s middle forward unit as the Broncos dominated the early NRLW years.

Having won the 2019 and 2020 deciders at the Broncos, the NRLW star was vital to rousing Newcastle from winless wooden spooners in 2021 to premiers the next season.

But the chance to equal Lazarus’ mark was not even on Elliott’s radar until her media commitments during grand final week.

“I wasn’t aware that that was a thing. Someone mentioned it the other day when I was doing a radio interview,” she said.

“Obviously that’s very special, (Lazarus) was an incredible player but at the end of the day I’m here to do a job with the Roosters.

“I think it’s probably something you’d look back on and reflect. At the time, you just want to do your best for the team.”

The Roosters suffered shock semi-final defeats in 2022 and 2023 before defeating Elliott’s former side Newcastle to advance to the decider.

At Accor Stadium on Sunday, Elliott will be motivated by finally doing justice to her side’s premiership potential, rather than by the slice of grand final history on offer.

“It’d mean so much just because of what we’re doing here at the club,” she said.

“Last year we felt that ***** of losing the semi-final (against Gold Coast). We wanted to go rewrite our wrongs and do better this year.”

In their second NRLW campaign, the Sharks shook off an alarming three-game losing streak to stun minor premiers Brisbane and punch their ticket to the grand final.

They remain outsiders against the Roosters, but that won’t faze Tony Herman’s side.

“Everyone’s kind of written us off, to be honest,” prop Holli Wheeler told AAP.

“(We’ve got) a little bit of an underdog tag where people have written us off and probably wrote us off a couple of weeks ago. We’ve just kind of stuck at it and believed in what we can do.

“What we’ve worked towards together, you’ll see it on Sunday. We don’t need everyone else to believe in us. We believe in us and we know what we’ve got behind the walls here at Cronulla.”

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