Obed Karwhin lived many kids' dream when he scored a hat-trick on debut for the Wests Tigers Under-20s team last week.
But the young winger's path to the ANZ Stadium was not the typical story of a talented junior destined to play the sport.
Karwhin grew up in the Ivory Coast during a period of violence and instability.
Just over a decade ago, Karwhin and his mother and his younger brother walked hundreds of kilometres through the jungle from Yamoussoukro in the Ivory Coast and over the Guinea border to escape the First Ivorian Civil War.
He told SBS that his childhood was “tough. Very tough”.
“It's not easy running away from war twice, especially at the age of two and five," he said.
'I can still remember everything'
The Ivorian Civil War began in 2002 and divided sections of the country between the government-held south and the rebel-held north. It is estimated that from 2002 to 2007, the conflict resulted in more than 1600 deaths and many more wounded.
If not for a moment of serendipity amid this chaos, Karwhin may never have seen his family again.
“War broke out, everyone came and gone,” he said.
“The only person left at the school was the principal and if I'd gone to his house I would never have seen my family again.
“But, just before he crossed the intersection to go to his house I saw my cousin running over through the dead bodies and the bullets. She came and took me. I was a very, very lucky child to have ran away from war, [we] spent a month in the jungle.”
Although it's been years, the hardship and anguish of that experience is still raw.
“We had to walk from Ivory Coast to the jungle to Guinea, and walking from there is like walking from here to Melbourne,” he said.
“Whatever you see in the jungle you pretty much eat… I can still remember everything.”
Karwhin arrived in Western Sydney as a refugee when he was eight.
After a stint playing rugby union, he found the sport he now loves and plays rugby league professionally, through the local Blacktown PCYC.
Coach Steve Warwick said Karwhin was unpolished when he first picked up the ball, but had a strong work ethic.
“He was a very raw player, but he had some ability there,” he said.
“We just watched him grow, gave him the right training and ended up being one of the best that we've probably had out of this club.”
Africa United
Over the course of several years, Warwick noticed an influx of African Australians from refugee backgrounds coming to the Blacktown PCYC League team.
He decided to provide them with a team to represent their national heritage and formed the Africa United team.
From 2012, Africa United has competed in Rugby League's annual multicultural tournament, the Harmony Cup.
But after the success of Karwhin and the team as a whole, Blacktown PCYC wants to take it a step further.
"We want to put it forward as a PCYC Rugby League academy, where we'll concentrate on the African kids getting them involved and bringing them up to speed with elite training and skills,” Warwick said.
“It will also be open to kids of other nationalities as well, but we want to focus on the African kids as much we can.”
If it goes ahead, the Blacktown African Australian Rugby League Academy will be the first of its kind.
And it won't be short of talent, with under-13s stars like Frank Bosco and Isaac Guba already securing try-outs with western Sydney rugby league teams.
"It will also be open to kids of other nationalities as well, but we want to focus on the African kids as much we can."
Bosco, a Kenyan-Australian, said seeing Karwhin score three tries in the big league made him realise the possibilities the game can provide.
“It was pretty good how he played and scored from the sidelines,” he said.
“I'm impressed, he's like the first African to make it to play Rugby League, that I know of.”
Karwhin said while the game had given him a lot he and some of his fellow African-Australian players in Blacktown had experienced racism.
"It used to come from the crowd and it used to come from the players," he said. "[They would say], 'Go back to your own country, you black this, you black that'."
But discrimination won’t dent his determination to make a career from the sport.
"If words could hurt me, I'd probably be dead by now. But if I can run away from war and if I can survive, then words are nothing to me.”
