Matt Gafa (born 31 August 1978) is an Australian former 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 in the 1990s and 2000s. He was a

Malta Malta, officially the Republic of Malta, is an island country in Southern Europe located in the Mediterranean Sea, between Sicily and North Africa. It consists of an archipelago south of Italy, east of Tunisia, and north of Libya. The two ...

international. He last played for Harlequins RL 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 had 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 Rugb ...

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 has also played in

Elite One Championship Super XIII is the top level rugby league competition in France, sanctioned by the French Rugby League Federation. The season runs from September to April, which is in contrast to the majority of other major domestic rugby league competitions ...

in France. Gafa's usual position was as a . He could also operate on the . In 2007, he has moved into the forwards in the , and has also operated at . In the past he had also operated in the role.

Playing career

Gafa made his first grade debut for Canberra in Round 1 1997 against Cronulla-Sutherland. In 2003, Gafa was a member of the reserve grade premiership winning team scoring an individual 348 points. After a six-year absence from first grade, Gafa returned to the team in 2004 and became a regular starter before departing for England at the end of 2005. Gafa joined Harlequins in 2006 who were previously known as the

London Broncos The London Broncos are a professional rugby league club based in Wimbledon, London, Wimbledon, England. They play their home games at Plough Lane and currently compete in the RFL Championship, Championship, the second tier of British rugby le ...

. At one point in his career at Harlequins, he was the leading try-scorer in 2008's

Super League XIII Engage Super League XIII was the official name, due to sponsorship, for the 2008 Super League season by Engage Mutual. Twelve teams competed for the League Leader's Shield over 27 rounds (including Magic Weekend, Millennium Magic), after which th ...

running in 4-tries in the opening two rounds of the engage

. Gafa left Harlequins at the end of 2009 to return to Australia. Gafa then became captain of the Belconnen United Scholars in the Canberra Raiders Cup.

Post playing

Gafa currently works for the Australian Bureau of Statistics in Belconnen.

References

External links

Quins RL Profile

Quins swoop for Australian Gafa

Pulling up trees
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gafa, Matt 1978 births Living people Australian people of Maltese descent Australian expatriate rugby league players in England Australian rugby league players Canberra Raiders players London Broncos players Malta national rugby league team players Rugby league centres Rugby league players from Canberra Rugby league second-rows Rugby league wingers