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Get your Melbourne Cup kitRockstar Reece: How Walsh captured the attention of England
Nicholas Quinlan • November 3rd, 2025 5:59 pm
Reecemania is still in full swing in the British Isles following Australia’s Ashes victory against England, according to Channel 7’s Jelisa Apps.
Since arriving in the country for the first Rugby League Ashes in 22 years, Reece Walsh has garnered most of the attention for the Kangaroos following his stellar finish to the season.
And with that attention, he backed it up in spades with a dominant performance at Wembley Stadium, helping secure a 26-6 win.
While Walsh was not as dominant as he was in the First Ashes Test, Australia was able to pull through with a 14-4 win to claim the Rugby League Ashes early Sunday morning with a game to spare.
But despite that, Apps, who is over in England for the series, noted that most of the attention from an English perspective has been on Walsh, with the likes of Nathan Cleary falling under the radar of the public.
“To me, on a football scale of things for me as a fan, the biggest player in the game is Nathan Cleary,” Apps said on SEN 1170’s Afternoons with Jimmy Smith.
“Nathan Cleary doesn’t register over here at all. I guess those people that are really diehard, yeah, he registers, but not with that rockstar kind of appeal.
“Reece is the rockstar over here, they were absolutely giving it (to him) when he got sin-binned at the end.
“And everyone was waiting around for Reece afterwards; it was so funny.
“Some people that met him were in tears and speaking to some of the fans, they said ‘we never though that we’d get to meet him’.
“Reece takes it all in his stride, he doesn’t even care when they are giving it to him, he just sees that as promotion of the game.”
The Rugby League Ashes will conclude on Sunday morning (AEDT) with the Kangaroos looking to make it a clean sweep against England at Headingley Stadium in Leeds.
Kick off will take place at 1:30am.
