Once the best schoolboy player in the country, Adrian Trevilyan is poised for his NRL debut

Raiders bench hooker Adrian Trevilyan will make his NRL debut against the Cowboys on Saturday as the new heir in a glorious lineage of schoolboy stars to crack the big time.

With COVID wrecking havoc with the 2020 and 2021 seasons, Trevilyan is the most recent winner of the Peter Sterling Medal for the best schoolboy player in the country after steering Kirwan State High School to victory in the NRL Schoolboys Cup back in 2019.

He joined some esteemed company. Some of the winners over the last two decades include David Fifita, Payne Haas, Adam Reynolds, Ben Te'o and Ryan James.

Trevilyan is a cunning rake with a strong defensive game and a golden eye for an attacking opportunity, especially close to the line, but a quick look at previous winners of the medal proves that natural talent isn't enough for even the best young player to make the grade.

For every Fifita and Haas, for every Ben Elias and Greg Alexander, there's a Gerard McCallum or a Michael Carl, a Kris Flint or a Matthew Mundine, players for whom, for whatever reason, things just didn't work out when they tried to make the NRL.

But according to Todd Wilson, who coached Trevilyan at Kirwan, the Raiders playmaker was always going to make the most of his considerable talents.

«First and foremost he was just super dedicated. His work ethic was outstanding and he listened, he took things on board. His attitude for improvement, to take on information, was fantastic for starters, but he has a natural footballing instinct,» Wilson said.

«He knows when to run it and when to look for it, he's got great service and he's skilful. He's a strong defender and he defends so well through the middle.

»I love his footballing nous, how creative he is out of nine. He knows how to take a