The Cessnock Curtain: How Fletcher Sharpe – and his hair – became the face of Newcastle

If the city of Newcastle walked up to the bathroom mirror on Sunday morning, and gazed upon its reflection, what would it see?

Staring back would be a man in a mullet, the blonde tips immediately visible. He would be the son of a coal miner. He’d own a greyhound and have done a stint as a plumber. He’d play cricket in summer and footy in winter (for the Cessnock Goannas). Fish and golf with mates and still live at home with his folks.

And when walking – no, bounding – around the working-class town he proudly calls home, sporting a grin from ear to ear that screams to the world: “How bloody good is life?”

That face in the mirror belongs to Fletcher Sharpe.

If there is a more Newcastle man in Newcastle, we are yet to find him.

“Being born and bred out in Cessnock and growing up here, this is your hometown team,” Sharpe says.

“Still [live] at home, still out in the ’Nock. That town is buzzing at the moment; they’re all Newy fans out there. It’s super cool just walking around town. You can be stopped at a traffic light or walking through the street, and people are yelling out ‘Up the Knights’ and ‘Go Newy’. It’s just super cool.”

Cessnock Curtain. That’s the name of Sharpe’s greyhound. It’s had 47 starts, for 10 wins and $29,360 in prize money. It’s also a nod to his mullet, one that has become ubiquitous in Newcastle. At Wednesday’s open Knights training session at McDonald Jones Stadium, more than 12,000 fans poured in to honour their grand final heroes. We lost count of how many of them paid homage to Fletcher with their own Cessnock Curtains.

“It’s super cool when you see the young fellas come up to you and say, ‘I’ve got a haircut like you’. It gives you a good feel,” Sharpe says. I’ve been rocking it for a while now, and I reckon I’d look weird without one, so it might be sticking around for a bit.”

When Alex McKinnon first laid eyes on Sharpe as a 16-year-old, he couldn’t envisage the superstar he was to become. No one could. McKinnon, working as a Knights recruiter at the time, saw a halfback as lean as the greyhound he now owns, just when the club’s Harold Matthews team needed one. The first contract the youngster signed was for $1000. For two seasons.

“I can honestly say the first time I watched him play, I didn’t think he could do this. I didn’t, mate,” McKinnon reflects.

“They ended up picking him at fullback, and he hasn’t looked back. I never envisioned what he does now from what I saw when I first watched him, not at all.”

What he does now, no other player can do. Sharpe can run around a defender. Or through them. On occasion, he’s even been known to hurdle over them. These are skills that can’t be taught. He’s what the purists call a “pure footballer”, capable of affecting the result regardless of the number on his back.

“He creates like no one else can,” says McKinnon, who believes the 22-year-old should be picked for Australia’s World Cup campaign. “He has great speed, a real X-factor.

“He can play wing, he can play centre, he can play five-eighth, he can play fullback, and you can play him in the middle if you really want to. He has that personality that’s able to adapt to the modern-day game.”

Says current Knights assistant coach Steve Hales: “Absolute knockabout. The most humble person in the game. He is one of the most laid-back people off the field, but the most competitive person on it.”

Sharpe is tough as well. You only have to look at the resilience required to come back from a career-threatening injury midway through last year. In the clash with the Dolphins in Western Australia, Sharpe suffered a ruptured spleen and lacerated kidney that required immediate surgery.

As the five-eighth lay in a hospital bed in Perth, far from family and long after his teammates had flown home, Sharpe wondered if it was Cessnock curtains for his career.

“Definitely, those were thoughts that crossed my mind early on for sure,” Sharpe says. “When you’re lying there on your own in Perth, on the other side of the country, thoughts keep coming into your head, and you’re getting told things by different people.

“Once I got back home and spoke with specialists here and the medical staff at the club, they filled me with confidence. They said everything was looking good, and if all went well, I should make a full recovery. Luckily enough, I did, and it’s all in the past now, so I’m super grateful.”

So, too, are his teammates. They love not only his skill, courage and passion, but also his innate Newcastle-ness.

“No, there’s no better Newcastle bloke than him,” declares forward Pasami Saulo. “He typifies Newcastle – the look, the way he plays, and the way he carries himself.”

Kalyn Ponga has been the talisman that has propelled last year’s wooden spooners all the way to the big dance. He is the king of the kingdom. But in Sharpe, the locals see a bit of themselves, the everyman made good.

“He’s special, mate,” McKinnon says. “He just fits within the community, you know what I mean? He could go down to the pub and be one of them, and he’d probably feel the most comfortable.”

Back in 2023 – a year before his first-grade debut – Cronulla tried to prise Sharpe out of Newcastle. In exchange, they offered Lachie Miller, an Olympic Sevens rugby player with NRL experience. On paper it seemed a reasonable trade, but the Knights would have none if it.

There is no taking Newcastle out of the boy, or the boy out of Newcastle.

“I’m glad I’m still here, Newcastle is home for me,” Sharpe grins.

“I love it here. It’s just a super-cool group to be a part of at the moment, and we’re riding the wave. There’s a lot of belief around here, and the town is jumping on the back of us. It’s just super exciting, and I can’t wait for Sunday.”