Jack Charles' firm self-evaluation serves as motivator as Hull FC half outlines goals

To say that Jack Charles is his own biggest critic is a more than fair assessment. The teenager is a self-confessed rugby league tragic, and he analyses every detail.

Determined to get better, the half-back's energy is there to see, with the former Beverley Braves talent focused on repetition, whether through skill or fitness. Again, it's all in the details.

Reflecting on an impressive 17-game haul from his first season in Super League, Charles has already identified his improvements. Never satisfied, he just wants to become the best player he can be and make a mark on the club he supported growing up.

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"It's probably a good thing and a bad thing, in a way, but I know I'll always be looking to get better and improve as a player," Charles told Hull Live when asked about critiquing his own performance. "I just want to keep learning and keep improving.

"I say it all of the time, but that's just the way it is. I take it day by day and session by session. I wake up, and I think, 'How can I get better today?' That could be doing something I did yesterday again or doing something new. I'll always be wanting to improve as a player and as a person."

He continued: "Defence is a massive one for me. I want to get stronger, bigger, which will come with age, but it's little detail stuff, where on the field I'm getting to and when I'm doing certain stuff in the game, composure, patience, and not overcomplicating things when they go wrong. I want to stick to the same system and the same plays and run them constantly. You see Nathan Cleary do it all of the time; he's not playing spectacular plays; he's just doing the same things constantly and throughout the game. It's all repetition, training, extras, skill, and then doing that constantly.

"I criticise myself all of the time, look back on games, and realise it's always meant to be hard. It's not easy. I'll have a lot more hard moments in my career, but it's all about how you come back from them and how you react—do you shy away from it or do you go again? I know what I'll be doing."

But despite Charles' firm evaluation, there was light. This is a player who gets it, who defies his youthful years, and who will hopefully go on to have a stellar career at the club after showing initial promise in what was a struggling and disjointed side that won just three of 28 games.

"I have reflected a lot," Charles said on 2024. "It is still a bit weird thinking how the year went, but I understand what I've got to do to get better and how I can push myself. I learned so much through the year, but it wasn't nice losing; I want to win, I'm a winner, and I don't want to be losing like we did. I'm as determined as ever to put wrongs right for next year.

"Towards the back end of the season, I was playing, but I wasn't really playing. I wasn't myself. I was just there, really. At the start of the year, there were some positives in how I'd like to play going forward. It's just about how I can take them and learn from the things that I wasn't so happy with.

"I'd like to think at the start of the year my energy and enthuaium coming in were on show, and just like I was when it was a fast ruck, I like to think I forgot everything and just ran the ball. I did lose that confidence towards the back end. I was a bit hesitant, and maybe thinking about the next play when it should be that play, but I definitely learned a lot from it.

"The hardest thing for me was coming off and feeling like you've let people down. That was the way I felt about it; people have told me I didn't let anyone down, but that's the way I thought, coming off and thinking. 'I've let the club, the fans, and my family down.' That was the hardest bit, but I know myself that I gave absolutely everything in those games."

Currently in rehab, Charles is hoping to be back from a hamstring within the next several weeks and stamp his mark once more, impressing again a new coach in John Cartwright, who has already been encouraged by the teenagers attitude this term.

"He seems really good," Charles added on Cartwright. "He really knows his stuff. But whatever coach comes in, I'd like to think they would see how hard I work and they realise that I'm obsessed with this game. It's all I want to do, so if I work hard, then I'll have a good relationship with him.

"Of course, you want your club behind you and the coach to back you. I know that I've got that, but I need to work hard and prove to myself I can do it and prove it to the people who believe in me. That's what I'll be doing when I get back."

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