HIS name sits at the top of the leading tryscorers' tally but Tim Walton is unlikely to feature on the list of players opposition sides fear.
And that is exactly the way Hamilton coach Scott Coleman likes it.
Coleman has nothing but praise for the unheralded Hawks winger, who has crossed for 13 tries in 10 games to share the mantle with powerhouse Merewether flyer Bill Coffey as the competition's best finisher.
Walton had the claim to himself until Coffey ran in four tries against The Waratahs on Saturday.
"I wouldn't swap him for any other winger," Coleman said.
"He is without a doubt one of the most underrated players in the competition.
"I was surprised he was not in the representative squad last year, but he has taken his game to an even higher level.
"There is not a great deal of him, but he is naturally strong and, pace-wise, he is in the top three or four at our club."
An engineer from Taree, Walton joined the Hawks in 2004 as a colts player.
He made his run-on first-grade debut in 2008 and scored a brace in the Hawks' 35-20 grand final victory over University that year.
Not surprisingly, since then he has been a permanent fixture at left wing or in the centres.
Walton said he had never experienced a season like this one.
"It's a good backline to be on the end of," he said.
"I haven't had to work very hard for my tries, I can tell you that.
"It has been the guys inside of me getting me the ball in space. They create them, I just put the ball down."
Coleman had a different view on Walton's try-scoring exploits.
"The biggest thing about him this season is that he is backing himself," Coleman said.
"He has come in looking for the ball a lot more, and when he has found some space he has backed himself to beat the defender on the outside rather than step inside all the time.
"He has not been afraid to take them on."
Walton shares a house with the Hawks' Canadian centre, Jordan Kohn, who is expected back from Calgary on July 10 where he has been doing rehabilitation on a hamstring injury. Kohn is a gym fanatic, something Walton is not.
"We are complete opposite ends of the scale there," he laughed.
"He loves it and tries to go twice a day. I have steered cleared of them my whole life. I don't get much out of it."
But one thing the pair share is a desire to play representative rugby.
"Rep footy is something I put a bit of thought towards at the end of last season," Walton said.
"You come up against the guys that are in the rep team or have been in the past and it is the type of games you want to play well in.
"It creeps into the back of my mind every now and then, but if I get a run I get a run."
If he keeps scoring tries at this rate, it will be impossible to leave him out.
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