When injuries had Melbourne Storm’s Ryan Papenhuyzen at his lowest ebb, time on the farm with club legend Billy Slater, and his horses, boosted his spirits.
When Melbourne Storm full-back Ryan Papenhuyzen was at his lowest ebb, it was club legend Billy Slater who was there to pick him up. Serious injuries have ruined his past three NRL campaigns. The first was a broken knee cap which required more than 14 months of recovery and rehabilitation, the second a fractured ankle sustained a few weeks into his NRL return last season.
, that Slater and his wife Nicole reached out to the Storm star and offered him a stay at their family farm outside of Melbourne. Papenhuyzen quickly accepted the offer to return to his “other rehab clinic”. Now, he is set to return to the Storm’s No.1 jersey when they host reigning premiers Penrith Panthers at AAMI Park on Friday night, the 25-year-old primed to once again stamp his presence on the game. Time with Slater’s horses, and his family, helped clear Papenhuyzen’s head, and he revealed his gratitude to the Slaters in an interview with Nine’s“I feel like the third child in the Slater family. Credit to you and Nic. You reached out straight away and said if you need some time away, we will open our doors up to you,” Papenhuyzen said in the interview.“It’s something I’ll be forever grateful for. You’ve been through a tough rehab yourself and understood the feelings I was having and the importance of getting away. Even if it’s doing nothing all day, it’s just not thinking about footy.” Slater’s love of horses is well documented but Papenhuyzen needed a crash course in equine whispering from the man who set the standard for NRL full-backs.“You have the horses down in the paddock and when I first got here I was a bit tentative, a bit scared but even some of the horsemanship stuff we did, it took my mind away from footy,” Papenhuyzen said. “You can get drained out when you think about footy but can’t do anything about it. To come out here and get that instant gratification of leading a horse around the yard – learn something different. There is no better teacher than yourself, but it was daunting at times.” “Working with a 500-kilogram animal that you have no control over – it takes you out of your comfort zone,” Slater said with a laugh.“Most severe hay fever I had ever it too,” he recalled. “It was very uncomfortable but I remember telling my mates about what I’d done. I’m a horse guy now.” Papenhuyzen feels he is close to his dynamic best and wants to make up for lost time since his stunning arrival in the NRL which“It’s been a bit of rollercoaster the last few years,” Papenhuyzen said. “I had the highs early in my career and now the lows the past couple of years but that’s footy. Hopefully, I can climb back up that mountain and experience the highs again.”“I look at that and can see its broken but it wasn’t until the surgeon started shaking his head, saying that was one of the worst ones ,” Papenhuyzen recalled. “He said I should take a photo of it but not share it – but it was too good not to post, my knee is in pieces. “He was quite positive about the process of it all, he was probably doing it to keep my hopes high but it wasn’t until I had surgery and spoke to people that I realised I was in for a long haul. I was talking to the physio and saying I would be all good in three months, then fast-forward 14 months later. As it goes further on, I realised how bad it was. “I always thought I would get back to play. It was more about how long it would take for me to feel good again.”Papenhuyzen is only focused on playing for the Storm and staying injury free. But he still dreams of playing for NSW. “It’s probably not at the forefront of my mind but I’d love to beat those Queenslanders but in what form that is, I don’t know,” Papenhuyzen said to Slater, a Queensland legend. “We will see what happens. You watch it as a kid, so you aspire to do it one day but after the last few years I’ve had, it’s not a priority.“The priority is playing good footy but I do think my footy is good enough to be in a Blues or Australian jumper, it’s just putting that together, getting a few reps in and putting myself out there.”While Papenhuyzen hinted his mullet could receive some subtle changes this season, he doesn’t plan to cut off his iconic locks.“I used to think mums were disappointed in it, I know my mum asks me to cut it every time I see her.“But there were a few times I tied it back for photos and the amount of messages I got from mums saying, ‘Oh my god, you better not have cut it as my kid will be livid’. “You have to look at the flipside of things. I don’t plan on cutting it any time soon, but I may make a few changes.”
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