The article is from 2007. I can't find the original link as it's now gone from the website.
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Rangi the renegade cuts to the chase
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Rangi Chase has had tougher battles than facing Darren Lockyer on his run-on debut.
Rangi Chase was a teenage thug: a law-breaker, drug-taker, and menace to the society of a small southern town in New Zealand's north island.
He wants people to know this, because Chase hopes to become an inspiration for youngsters whose self-confidence takes a battering from the knocks of hard life: "If I can do it, anyone can do it".
The 21-year-old makes his NRL run-on debut tonight wearing the Dragons' contentious No.6 jersey, lining up against the world's best player, Darren Lockyer. However, young Chase has conquered far tougher foes than Lockyer; self-doubt, evil temptation and grief.
Chase was smoking marijuana and drinking alcohol in primary school, a by-product of living in a house with walls splashed in beer, walls that muffled the sounds of domestic violence within.
It was his grandparents' house in rural Dannevirke, a town where most of the population are employed in a giant meatworks factory. Chase was born to a 15-year-old mother and a father who ran off and started a family with another woman. His mother Reremai agreed that her parents should raise Rangi due to difficult personal circumstances.
Chase received plenty of love from his nan Kara, and "koro" - or grandfather - Rangi, whom he was named after. But, "they liked to drink, a lot". And his koro was a demon on the drink.
When he was 14, Chase's grandmother died of a stroke. "I used to see my nan getting a hiding," Chase says. "When she died I felt really guilty, I still keep asking myself why I never stepped in and tried to stop it. To be honest, I was scared man, I was only young."
But he doesn't harbour anger towards his grandfather - in fact, Chase admires the man greatly and credits him for being a father figure. "He was always telling his drinking mates that I would play for the Kiwis or All Blacks. My koro was a hard man, tough on his kids - it's a big family, my mum's got 11 brothers and sisters. But my grandad had a soft spot for me," Chase says. "I went everywhere with him, the pub, the TAB. Sometimes we would be at the pub until midnight, I would be sitting under the table. If he drove anywhere, I'd be in the front seat, I was his little sidekick.
"I have this image of him in my head. He would always take me to footy games, and stand on the sidelines with a beer in one hand, and a leash holding our little pet dog in the other. He was always at my games, he still is."
Chase has met his biological father only twice. "It was weird calling him dad, because he was never a dad to me," he says. "I wish I never met him. I don't want to see him again."
A year after his grandmother passed, his koro died, and Chase's world began caving in. As his heart grew colder, he sought the warm solace of his koro's poison. The world offered him no future, so he looked for one at the bottom of bottles.
He left his mother's house and went to live with his uncle and auntie, Danny and Debby Hauraki, who took him in as a fourth son. Had he not gone to play a rugby league trial on a whim five years ago with his cousin, Eels player Weller Hauraki, his two childhood friends now embody what could have become of this sharp-stepping league star.
"One is a drug addict, the other's in a gang. I snapped out of it, my two mates are pretty stuffed," Chase says. "If I didn't move from where I was I could be in jail. At Weller's house, everybody was well-behaved, so I was afraid of getting into trouble, and uncle Danny become like a father to me."
The Wanganui league trial - in which Chase and Hauraki played while "half-drunk" - led to rapid selection for both in the New Zealand under-16s team, from where Chase was scouted by the Wests Tigers and placed in the club's scholarship program at Queensland's Keebra Park High School.
He moved to a Gold Coast house with four room-mates including the Tigers' Benji Marshall. "I didn't want to get sent home, I didn't want people to think I was a failure," Chase says. So at school he kept his head down, temper in check, and graduated to the big leagues.
After a year with the Tigers, he was signed by the Dragons and this season has impressed in premier league at hooker. While he has hardly played five-eighth, Dragons coach Nathan Brown has decided Chase is the best man for the playmaking position against the reigning premiers.
"Here I am, about to play against the best No.6 in the world," Chase says. "I feel lucky where I am - just to come out and make something of my life, that's what made me who I am today.
"If I'd never gone through some of that I'd probably be taking things for granted."
Back in Dannevirke live his mother, two sisters, a step-sister and two step-brothers - one who, at 17 years, is dying of cancer. Chase won't be calling him in his final days, however: "I hardly know him, what am I going to say? It feels weird, it's not our fault that we don't know each other."
But there are others he can help. "A lot of my family aren't well off, haven't got what I've got now," he says. "I want my family to look up to me, all my little cousins.
"My grandparents will be proud of me now." '"
You can see why he said he wants to stay in England and doesn't want to go back to NZ.
