Chris Rattue: Big not always the most beautiful in sport

It's wonderful to see a few little men still surviving, and flourishing, in the NRL.

Apart from the obvious exception of horse racing, little people have just about been forgotten in the era of professional sport.

Sport has an extra magic when it accommodates all shapes and sizes, because it more accurately reflects normal life.

The definition of what rates as small in sport has been blown up out of all proportion however.

American baseballers look like they've been on steroids, which a lot of them have, and even basketballers who appear to be short turn out to be skyscrapers when you stand beside them.

Tennis players don't look like John McEnroe any more, and not only in the frizzy hair and bandana department. The best female players on the planet, okay the Williams sisters, are also very well built.

The Blues have a 98kg halfback. A lot of cricketers, especially good ones like the Australians, are clearly doing gym time.

Even many English premiership footballers look enormous, the reason being that a lot of them are.

You can't stretch this argument everywhere, but you get the gist of this increasingly bigger picture.

Rugby league isn't downsizing, as an opening day look at the Storm's superstar Greg Inglis clearly showed. An enlarged Inglis pinged St George Illawarra pivot Jamie Soward around like a pinball.

But those nippy and nifty hookers, halves and fullbacks are as valuable as ever, men who can help their teams reach the heights even though they don't. You also have to admire how these modern-day midgets compete physically with the bevy of behemoths who barge around the competition.

Of course mandatory weight training has ensured that there aren't any true lightweights in top flight rugby league any more, with the exception that proves the rule being the little Pom Rob Burrow.

This appropriately surnamed ducker and diver from Leeds is listed at 66kg, his weight when wringing wet. If you actually wanted to get Burrow wringing wet, you could dip him in a bucket of water.

The NRL isn't full of mini-men, but there are enough of them. And they are big contributors to the spectacle, led by Billy Slater and Matt Bowen.

The Warriors are heavy in the little department with Nathan Fien, Ian Henderson, Stacey Jones and Lance Hohaia on board. One of the Warriors on the rise, junior fullback Kevin Locke, is 175cm tall and barely 80kg.

The player who caught everyone's eye at Mt Smart Stadium on Saturday night was Hohaia.

Appearing off the bench, the 175cm tall Hohaia carried on from his scintillating form last year, scoring two tries against the Eels and causing them plenty of bother.

Famous people get Punk'd on a TV series, and famous footballers get Lanced in the NRL.

There isn't really anyone else like Hohaia, a mini cannonball on scampering legs who has a sort of roving commission to turn up in troublesome places.

One of his strangest attributes is an ability to run smack bang at what seems to be a wall and turn it into a hole. He scored one of his two tries in this manner on Saturday night, and defenders almost seem bamboozled at having to aim a little lower than usual. By the time they've readjusted, they've been Lanced again.

Like the other little men who survive and flourish in the NRL, Hohaia is immensely strong for his size. Hohaia has that x-factor, an innate ability to get past defenders who think they have him in their grasp.

It is enormously satisfying seeing Hohaia thriving in the NRL. He comes from out of the battling environment of New Zealand league, from the provinces, and at one point his career appeared to be on the skids in Auckland.

He always had a lot of fans (I was one of his doubters), people who would bang their fist on the table and demand that he be given more of a shot.

I often thought this might be a case of misplaced parochialism, and suspected that Hohaia didn't have the overall nous for the game to be a starting hooker or half. Hohaia's strengths can shine as an interchange player, although he starred as a makeshift fullback for club and country last year. There will inevitably be calls to get Hohaia into the starting lineup, but Warriors coach Ivan Cleary might reason he has enough quality in his starters and Hohaia gives the club a winning lift off the bench.

The Warriors will certainly miss Hohaia, as he recovers from a knee injury. Without his impact, and a run of errors from Parramatta's Eric Grothe and Jarryd Hayne, the Warriors might have struggled for the much anticipated opening night win.

As much as Hohaia impressed, to my mind it was the aura of another little man which shone most over Saturday night's frantic and absorbing opening to the Warriors season.

It was impossible to watch the Warriors at work without wondering what impact Stacey Jones will have on this side.

I can't wait for Stacey Jones to make his comeback - a fabled return is what the drama of sport is all about.

There are risks, and no guarantees. The Warriors halves - Nathan Fien and Joel Moon - did okay. But they weren't flawless, and Fien's general kicking was a worry.

Of course this new pairing deserves the time to fine tune their combination, and Moon has already struck up a likely link with Jerome Ropati. Judgments must be strongly qualified after just one round.

On a purely selfish level though, I'm just itching to see Jones in the Warriors jersey again.

It will be a great occasion, the return of a legend.

Most of the great men of New Zealand rugby league have been the big men. Mark Graham, Ruben Wiki, Sonny Bill Williams ...

Jones may be the greatest of them all though. He might not be able to match Hohaia's legs or rival Fien's defence. But the top five centimetres could more than make up for what has aged in the 165cm below.