Travis Waddell (born 11 July 1989) is an Australian professional

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 112 ...

footballer who plays for the

Souths Logan Magpies The Souths Logan Magpies, more commonly referred to by their former names Southern Suburbs Magpies, or South Brisbane Magpies, or often simply referred to as Souths, are a rugby league football club based in the southern suburbs of Brisbane, Au ...

in the

Intrust Super Cup The Queensland Cup, currently known as the Hostplus Cup for sponsorship reasons, is the highest-level regional rugby league football competition in Queensland, Australia. It is run by the Queensland Rugby League (QRL) and is contested by four ...

. He plays as a . He previously played for the

Canberra Raiders The Canberra Raiders are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in the national capital city of Canberra, Australian Capital Territory. They have competed in Australasia's elite rugby league competition, the National Rugby ...

Newcastle Knights The Newcastle Knights are an Australian professional rugby league club based in Newcastle, New South Wales. They compete in Australasia's premier rugby league competition, the National Rugby League (NRL) premiership. Playing in red and blue, th ...

and most recently the

Brisbane Broncos The Brisbane Broncos Rugby League Football Club Ltd., commonly referred to as the Broncos, is an Australian professional rugby league football club based in Brisbane, Queensland. Founded in April 1987, the Broncos play in Australia's elite com ...

in the

National Rugby League The National Rugby League (NRL) is an Australasian rugby league club competition which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and New Zealand. The NRL formed in 1998 as a joint partnership ...

Background

Born in

Proserpine, Queensland Proserpine () is a rural town and locality in the Whitsunday Region, Queensland, Australia. In the , the locality of Proserpine had a population of 3,562 people. Geography Proserpine is situated on the Bruce Highway. Proserpine is located on ...

, Waddell played his junior football for the Proserpine Brahmans, before being signed by the

Playing career

Canberra

After a year with the Souths Logan Magpies, Waddell signed a contract with the

. He played for Canberra's

NYC New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Uni ...

team in 2008 and 2009, scoring 15 tries in 39 games. In Round 3 of the

2009 NRL season The 2009 NRL season was the 102nd season of professional rugby league football club competition in Australia, and the twelfth run by the National Rugby League. For the third consecutive year, sixteen teams competed for the 2009 Telstra Premiership ...

, Waddell made his

NRL The National Rugby League (NRL) is an Australasian rugby league club competition which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and New Zealand. The NRL formed in 1998 as a joint partnership ...

debut for the Canberra side against

Parramatta Parramatta () is a suburb and major Central business district, commercial centre in Greater Western Sydney, located in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located approximately west of the Sydney central business district on the ban ...

. At the end of 2009, Waddell was named at in the NYC Team of the Year. In 2010, Waddell was selected in the inaugural Indigenous All Stars team to play the NRL All Stars at

Skilled Park A skill is the learned ability to act with determined results with good execution often within a given amount of time, energy, or both. Skills can often be divided into domain-general and domain-specific skills. For example, in the domain of wo ...

on the

Gold Coast, Queensland The Gold Coast is a coastal city in the state of Queensland, Australia, approximately south-southeast of the centre of the state capital Brisbane. With a population over 600,000, the Gold Coast is the sixth-largest city in Australia, the nati ...

. He was again selected in 2011, 2012 and 2013. Waddell was a regular in the Canberra team in 2010, despite being off the field for ten weeks with a broken jaw. Waddell started 2011 again as a regular, but was demoted from the first-grade team as the capital club struggled, and joined feeder club Souths Logan Magpies for the remainder of the year. Waddell played 21 games for the Canberra outfit in 2012. At the end of the year he was released.

Newcastle

In 2013, Waddell returned to the Souths Logan Magpies in the

Queensland Cup The Queensland Cup, currently known as the Hostplus Cup for sponsorship reasons, is the highest-level regional rugby league football competition in Queensland, Australia. It is run by the Queensland Rugby League (QRL) and is contested by four ...

. However, in January,

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...

coach, Wayne Bennett asked Waddell to come and train with the

team a week each month while still playing for Souths Logan, with Newcastle CEO

Matthew Gidley Matthew "Matt" Gidley (born 1 July 1977) is an Australian former professional rugby league footballer and administrator. Gidley played for the Newcastle Knights in the ARL Premiership and the NRL, and St Helens in the Super League, and for ...

revealing that Waddell would train with the team in case he was needed during the season for the Novocastrians. On 4 March 2013, Waddell signed a two-year contract with the

, three days before the start of the

2013 NRL season The 2013 NRL season was the 106th season of professional rugby league club competition in Australia. The National Rugby League's main competition, named the 2013 Telstra Premiership after major sponsors Telstra Corporation, was contested by sixte ...

. In June 2013, the Newcastle side released Waddell back to the Souths Logan Magpies in the

for the remainder of the 2013 season but he returned to the club in 2014 on a full-time deal.

Brisbane

In September 2014, Newcastle Knights coach Wayne Bennett revealed that Waddell would be following him to the

in 2015 on a two-year contract. In 2021, Waddell signed with the Goondiwindi Boars as captain coach in the Toowoomba Rugby League competition. He led Goondiwindi to a Grand Final win that year. He is captain coach of Goondiwindi again in 2022.

Personal life

Waddell's mother is from

Badu Island Badu or Badu Island (; mwp, Badhu, ; also Mulgrave Island), is an island in the Torres Strait north of Thursday Island, Queensland, Australia. Badu Island is also a locality in the Torres Strait Island Region, and Wakaid is the only town, loc ...

in the

Torres Strait The Torres Strait (), also known as Zenadh Kes, is a strait between Australia and the Melanesian island of New Guinea. It is wide at its narrowest extent. To the south is Cape York Peninsula, the northernmost extremity of the Australian mai ...

, his father is, Aboriginal and from

Darwin, Northern Territory Darwin ( ; Larrakia: ) is the capital city of the Northern Territory, Australia. With an estimated population of 147,255 as of 2019, the city contains the majority of the residents of the sparsely populated Northern Territory. It is the smalle ...

. He is also of Vanuatuan descent. Waddell is related to Newcastle Knights player

Dane Gagai Dane Gagai () (born 3 January 1991) is a professional rugby league footballer and boxer who plays as a and er for the Newcastle Knights in the National Rugby League, NRL. He has played for Australia national rugby league team, Australia and th ...

Gold Coast Titans The Gold Coast Titans are a professional rugby league football club, based on the Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia. The club competes in the National Rugby League (NRL), Australia and New Zealand's national rugby league club competition. The ...

player

Josh Hoffman Josh Hoffman (born 10 March 1988) is a New Zealand international rugby league footballer who plays as and for the Townsville Blackhawks in the Queensland Cup. He previously played for the Brisbane Broncos, Gold Coast Titans and Parramatta Ee ...

and

AFL AFL may refer to: Sports * American Football League (AFL), a name shared by several separate and unrelated professional American football leagues: ** American Football League (1926) (a.k.a. "AFL I"), first rival of the National Football Leagu ...

players

Daniel Daniel is a masculine given name and a surname of Hebrew origin. It means "God is my judge"Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 68. (cf. Gabriel—"God is my strength" ...

Steven Stephen or Steven is a common English first name. It is particularly significant to Christians, as it belonged to Saint Stephen ( grc-gre, Στέφανος ), an early disciple and deacon who, according to the Book of Acts, was stoned to death; ...

, Shannon and

Marlon Motlop Marlon Motlop is an Indigenous Australian former Australian rules footballer who played with the Port Adelaide Football Club in the AFL. His final season was with Glenelg Football Club in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL) i ...

References

External links

Brisbane Broncos profileNRL profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Waddell, Travis 1989 births Australian rugby league players Indigenous Australian rugby league players Australian people of Vanuatuan descent Indigenous All Stars players Canberra Raiders players Newcastle Knights players Brisbane Broncos players Souths Logan Magpies players Mount Pritchard Mounties players Newcastle Yowies players Rugby league hookers Rugby league players from Queensland Living people