Playing Career
Gidley had a productive 2004 season (being 18th man for the NSW Blues), but missed most of season 2005 due to injury. He was then selected in the 2008 State of Origin series shortly after a fractured cheekbone.
In round 10 of the 2004 NRL season Gidley made history when he won the NRL's first ever golden point match by kicking the winning field goal after 3 minutes and 26 seconds of extra time. The Knights were without Andrew Johns for the season. That game was against the Broncos at Lang Park (Suncorp Stadium).
In 2006, Gidley travelled to Papua New Guinea to play for the Prime Minister's XIII against the Kumuls.
Gidley had a productive season in 2007. He scored multiple times for the Newcastle Knights as well as having done well at converting goals. He scored 15 points against the South Sydney Rabbitohs. He has also represented NSW in 2007 State of Origin.
In the final round of the 2007 season, with scores level at 24–24, he kicked a penalty goal 12 seconds before fulltime to give the Knights a 26–24 victory over the Wests Tigers (who needed to win to book a finals spot), which also ended a 7 match losing streak and allowed Newcastle to avoid the wooden spoon.
Gidley was the stand-out player at the club in the 2008 season as they finished ninth on the NRL ladder with 12 wins and 12 losses. Gidley led the scoring at the club with 150 points and also took the try-scoring award with nine tries. Regarded as one of the best utility players in the game, Gidley was also appointed captain of the Knights for the next season, replacing England-bound hooker and club legend Danny Buderus. At the end of the 2008 NRL season, Gidley was named the Newcastle club's player of the year.
In the 2009 season Kurt Gidley again lead the club's season in points as the Knights finished 7th after a good year. Kurt also achieved the second best percentage of kicking goals, with 82.1%, only being beaten by Michael Gordon with 93.4%.
Read more about this topic: Kurt Gidley
Famous quotes containing the words playing and/or career:
“I recently learned something quite interesting about video games. Many young people have developed incredible hand, eye, and brain coordination in playing these games. The air force believes these kids will be our outstanding pilots should they fly our jets.”
—Ronald Reagan (b. 1911)
“Work-family conflicts—the trade-offs of your money or your life, your job or your child—would not be forced upon women with such sanguine disregard if men experienced the same career stalls caused by the-buck-stops-here responsibility for children.”
—Letty Cottin Pogrebin (20th century)