Steve Folkes, the late, great Canterbury player and coach, is the first Australian rugby league player to be diagnosed with a brain disease commonly linked to repetitive head injury in American sports.

The local discovery of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) - a degenerative brain disease most likely caused by repeated head traumas - in Folkes has huge ramifications for the National Rugby League.

Speaking out: Steve Folkes' daughter Hayley Shaw and son Dan Folkes with Professor Michael Buckland, lefft, and Bulldogs chairwoman Lynne Anderson, right. Credit:Dominic Lorrimer

Researchers and clinicians from Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, NSW Health Pathology and the University of Sydney’s Brain and Mind Centre found evidence of CTE in two brains that were referred to them for diagnostic purposes.

Given confidentiality agreements and the sensitivities involved, the identities of the deceased players were not made public. The only information previously available was that they were middle-aged professionals who had played more than 150 first-grade games.