Whatever happened to Mitchell Pearce? Well, he moved to Europe, gave up the grog and converted to Islam

June 7, 2026 — 5:00am

You have reached your maximum number of saved items.

Remove items from your saved list to add more.

Mitchell Pearce is a NRL premiership winner with the Roosters and NSW State of Origin star. He now coaches the sport in France with the Catalans Dragons and has settled into his new European life with his wife, Lila, and daughter, Alyia.

Fitz: Mitchell! Great to chat. But enough about you. Let’s talk about me. I’m a biographer, and I love looking at the seminal moments in people’s lives, the moments that change the course of a life. And if somebody had said to me last week that Mitchell Pearce – the brilliant hell-raising footballer of not so long ago – is now a non-drinking, French-speaking married man who has converted to Islam and can give fluent bursts of Arabic, I would have said that is the most unheard of thing I’ve ever HEARD of, but...

Fitz: But here you are. So let’s look at the seminal moments in your life that led you to this. To start, when did you realise “My father [Tigers legend Wayne Pearce] is a seriously famous footballer”?

MP: Obviously, I knew early Dad was famous, but when you’re in that environment, you think it’s just the norm. As a kid, I was always around Leichhardt Oval and the Tigers. I was always at training and staying at Nan’s house, just down the road from there. Dad’s greatness always had this strong presence. But obviously as you get a little bit older you start to realise your own dad is not like other dads. And more than a great footy player, he’s a person of influence, and really respected. And I guess, naturally, I wanted to be like that.

Fitz: So, when did you realise not only is Dad a great footballer, but I also have serious ability?

MP: As soon as I started playing. Mum and Dad didn’t let me play footy ’til I was 10 years old. They didn’t want any sense of me being forced into it, or put any pressure on me to play. I played soccer until then. But I loved it from the moment I started. It wasn’t pushed on me but quickly became my passion. And I loved watching Andrew Johns, Matty Johns, Brad Fittler, those kind of guys from as soon as I knew what footy was. And I studied them, so it was obviously just a natural instinct for me to want to be like that as well, and be like my dad, I suppose.

Fitz: And your breakthrough?

MP: I made the Australian schoolboys side at my first opportunity. And then I started with the Sydney Roosters very young, so it was probably around that time that I started to play against the older kids and still hold my own that I started to feel even more confident.

Fitz: And the pinnacle of the whole thing, the moment when you felt, “I’m on the peak of Everest”?

MP: I debuted for the Roosters, young, at 17; I played State of Origin at 19. It all sort of happened quite fast. But winning the grand final was the best. We lost against the Dragons in 2010, but then beat Manly in the grand final in 2013. That was the highlight of my life, though there were different milestones and setbacks that........

© The Age