Cory Paterson (born 14 July 1987) is a retired Australian professional

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as rugby league in English-speaking countries and rugby 13/XIII in non-Anglophone Europe, is a contact sport, full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular Rugby league playin ...

footballer who played as a forward. He previously played for the

Newcastle Knights The Newcastle Knights are an Australian professional rugby league team based in Newcastle, New South Wales that competes in the National Rugby League (NRL) premiership. Playing in red and blue, the Knights joined the top-tier competition in New ...

North Queensland Cowboys The North Queensland Cowboys is an Australian professional rugby league football club based in Townsville, the largest city in North Queensland. They compete in Australia's premier rugby league competition, the National Rugby League (NRL). Sinc ...

and the

Wests Tigers The Wests Tigers is an Australian professional rugby league football team, based in the Inner West of Sydney and South Western Sydney. The Tigers have competed in the National Rugby League (NRL) since being formed at the end of the 1999 N ...

in the

NRL The National Rugby League (also known as the NRL Telstra Premiership for sponsorship reasons) is a professional rugby league competition in Oceania which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria (state), Victoria, the Austral ...

and

Hull Kingston Rovers Hull Kingston Rovers (often abbreviated to Hull KR) are a professional rugby league club based in Kingston upon Hull, Yorkshire, England. The club play home games at Craven Park, Hull, Craven Park and compete in Super League, the top tier of B ...

Leigh Centurions The Leigh Leopards are a professional rugby league club based in Leigh, Greater Manchester, England. Leigh play homes games at Leigh Sports Village and compete in Super League, the top tier of British rugby league system, British rugby league. ...

and the

Salford Red Devils The Salford Red Devils are a professional rugby league club in Salford, England. They play home games at Salford Community Stadium in Barton upon Irwell and compete in the Super League, the top tier of British rugby league system, British rugb ...

in the

Super League Super League (also known as the Betfred Super League for sponsorship reasons, and legally Super League Europe Ltd.) is a professional rugby league competition, and the highest level of the British rugby league system, which consists of twelve t ...

. He played for the

Toronto Wolfpack Toronto Wolfpack RLFC is a Canadian professional rugby league club based in Toronto, Ontario. The club is the first and only professional rugby league club in North America, and as of 2023 competes in the self sponsored Canada Cup, an invitation ...

and

Leigh Leigh may refer to: Places In England Pronounced : * Leigh, Greater Manchester, Borough of Wigan ** Leigh (UK Parliament constituency) * Leigh-on-Sea, Essex Pronounced : * Leigh, Dorset * Leigh, Gloucestershire * Leigh, Kent * Leigh, Staffor ...

in the

Championship In sport, a championship is a competition in which the aim is to decide which individual or team is the champion. Championship systems Various forms of competition can be referred to by the term championship. Title match system In this sys ...

. He is also a professional

boxer Boxer most commonly refers to: *Boxer (boxing), a competitor in the sport of boxing * Boxer (dog), a breed of dog Boxer or boxers may also refer to: Animal kingdom * Boxer crab * Boxer shrimp, a small group of decapod crustaceans * Boxer snipe ee ...

Background

Paterson was born in

Perth, Western Australia Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...

Career

After playing junior rugby league in his home town of

, with

South Perth Lions South Perth Lions Rugby League Club are an Australian rugby league football club based in South Perth, Western Australia formed in 1948. They conduct teams for both Juniors & Seniors. The club also participates in the WARL (Western Australian Rug ...

. Paterson then attended

St Francis Xavier's College, Hamilton St Francis Xavier's College Hamilton is a Catholic secondary school located in Hamilton, New South Wales, Australia. Founded in 1985 by the Marist Brothers as a Years 7 to 10 boys high school, the school is now co-educational and offers a variety ...

and in 2005 represented Australia at schoolboy level.

Newcastle

In 2007, Cory Paterson was promoted to train with the

first team squad. He made his début in round 2 of that year in a win against the St. George Illawarra Dragons. At the end of the 2008 season, Paterson was selected in the

Prime Minister's XIII Prime Minister's XIII, or sometimes informally referred to as the PM's XIII, a representative rugby league team, comprising Australian players from National Rugby League clubs that did not qualify for the NRL Finals, or whose teams were knocked ...

to play the Papua New Guinea national team in

Port Moresby (; Tok Pisin: ''Pot Mosbi''), also referred to as Pom City or simply Moresby, is the capital and largest city of Papua New Guinea. It is one of the largest cities in the southwestern Pacific (along with Jayapura) outside of Australia and New ...

. He then toured the United States to visit a number of

NFL The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The N ...

clubs and trial for the

Oakland Raiders The Oakland Raiders were a professional American football team based in Oakland, California, from its founding in 1960 to 1981, and again from 1995 to 2019 before Oakland Raiders relocation to Las Vegas, relocating to the Las Vegas metropolitan ...

as a punter. Paterson suffered depression during the 2009 season, causing him to miss some NRL matches, but returned to good form on the field in 2010 season, when he was selected for the Indigenous All Stars squad. In 2011, Paterson represented the Indigenous All Stars again, but midway through the season he was released from his contract by the Knights, a decision made by the club's incoming coach Wayne Bennett.

North Queensland

After being released by Newcastle, Paterson almost immediately signed for the

, on a contract to play for the remainder of the

2011 NRL season The 2011 NRL season was the 104th season of professional rugby league football club competition in Australia, and the fourteenth and last run by the National Rugby League's partnership committee of the Australian Rugby League and News Ltd. The ...

and two additional seasons. Paterson was told by the Knights that he was not part of their long-term plans and was free to look elsewhere for 2011 and beyond. Paterson converted to

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

during the 2011 season, requiring him to

fast Fast or FAST may refer to: Arts and entertainment * "Fast" (Juice Wrld song), 2019 * "Fast" (Luke Bryan song), 2016 * "Fast" (Sueco song), 2019 * "Fast" (GloToven song), 2019 * ''Fast'', an album by Custom, 2002 * ''Fast'', a 2010 short fil ...

during daylight hours in the month of August, co-inciding with the Cowboys run-in to the NRL finals series. Paterson is close to former professional

players

Anthony Mundine Anthony Steven Mundine (born 21 May 1975) is an Australian former professional boxer and rugby league footballer. In boxing he competed from 2000 to 2021, and held the World Boxing Association (WBA) super-middleweight title twice between 2003 a ...

and

Sonny Bill Williams Sonny William Williams (born 3 August 1985) is a New Zealand heavyweight boxer, and a former professional rugby league and rugby union player. He is only the second person to represent New Zealand in rugby union after first playing for the cou ...

, who both converted to Islam. He sought advice on fasting as a professional rugby league player from Hazem El-Masri, a devout Muslim who played over 300 first-grade matches for the

Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs The Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs are an Australian professional rugby league club based in Belmore, a suburb in the Canterbury-Bankstown region of Sydney. They compete in the NRL Telstra Premiership, as well as competitions facilitated by ...

. Paterson played 7 games for North Queensland in his first (half) season with the club, he was a member of their qualifying finals series team and scored 4 tries, including a double against the

. Paterson started the 2012 season of playing representative football for the Indigenous All Stars against the

NRL All Stars team The NRL All Stars team was a rugby league football team made up of professional players in the National Rugby League. These players were selected by fan vote. However, fans were only allowed to select one player from each NRL team to join the Au ...

, he then played in only 2 NRL matches for the North Queensland Cowboys after half the season had finished (starting in both, scoring one try) due to injuries and indifferent form.

Hull Kingston Rovers

On 27 June 2012, he signed a two-year deal with

side

. Paterson coached the Hawaiian All-stars rugby league representative team in their match against

Queensland Queensland ( , commonly abbreviated as Qld) is a States and territories of Australia, state in northeastern Australia, and is the second-largest and third-most populous state in Australia. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Austr ...

Indigenous at

Oahu, Hawaii Oahu (, , sometimes written Oahu) is the third-largest and most populated island of the Hawaiian Islands and of the U.S. state of Hawaii. The state capital, Honolulu, is on Oahu's southeast coast. The island of Oahu and the uninhabited Northw ...

on 27 October 2012. The match occurred during the

2012 Haida Gwaii earthquake The 2012 Haida Gwaii earthquake occurred just after . The shock had a moment magnitude scale, moment magnitude of 7.8 and a maximum Mercalli intensity scale, Mercalli Intensity of V (''Moderate''). The earthquake's epicentre was on Moresby Isla ...

, while tsunami alerts were issued for the islands. While at Hull KR, Paterson formed a successful combination with Michael Dobson. However, it has been reported he has sought an early release from the club to be with his family in Australia.

West Tigers

It was announced in August 2013 that Paterson would join NRL club

on a one-year deal starting in 2014. At the end of the

2014 NRL season The 2014 NRL season was the 107th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 17th season of the National Rugby League in Australia and New Zealand. The season started in New Zealand, for the Auckland Nines, replacing the Rugby Leagu ...

and after a total of 96 NRL appearances, Paterson announced his rugby league retirement to pursue his dream of a professional heavyweight boxing career.

Salford Red Devils

At the end of 2014, Paterson ended his brief rugby league retirement and agreed to a one-year deal to play for the Super League club

Salford Salford ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city in Greater Manchester, England, on the western bank of the River Irwell which forms its boundary with Manchester city centre. Landmarks include the former Salford Town Hall, town hall, ...

for the 2015 season. It saw him reunite with former teammate Michael Dobson. The deal includes the option of a second season at Salford.

Leigh Centurions

In September 2015, it was announced that Paterson would join

for the 2016 RFL Championship. In January 2016, he was made one of two vice-captains for the Centurions.

Toronto Wolfpack

In December 2017 Paterson joined the

on a two-year deal.

Boxing

On 5 October 2012, Paterson made a successful boxing début against Anton Tuilotolava. On 12 November 2014, he won his second fight, on the undercard of the Mundine-Rabchenko fight, against Michael Lua Tama by 1st-round TKO. It was his first fight since retiring from rugby league to begin a career in boxing.

Record

References

External links

Toronto Wolfpack profileLeigh Centurions profileCory Paterson boxing record

BoxRec BoxRec or boxrec.com is a website dedicated to holding updated records of professional and amateur boxers, both male and female. It also maintains a MediaWiki-based encyclopedia of boxing. The objective of the site is to document every profess ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Paterson, Cory 1987 births Living people Australian male boxers Australian Muslims Australian rugby league players Australian expatriate sportspeople in Canada Converts to Islam Heavyweight boxers Hull Kingston Rovers players Indigenous All Stars players Indigenous Australian boxers Lakes United Seagulls players Leigh Leopards players Newcastle Knights players North Queensland Cowboys players Prime Minister's XIII players Rugby league centres Rugby league players from Perth, Western Australia Rugby league second-rows Salford Red Devils players Toronto Wolfpack players Western Suburbs Rosellas players Wests Tigers NSW Cup players Wests Tigers players Australian expatriate rugby league players in England Sportsmen from Western Australia Expatriate rugby league players in Canada Northern Pride RLFC players 21st-century Australian sportsmen