Pearce out: Mitchell Pearce closes door on NRL return with Catalans retirement call

Veteran playmaker Mitchell Pearce has shut the door on a return to the NRL, announcing he will retire from rugby league.

Pearce will bow out after almost two decades in the game when the halfback completes his commitments with second-placed Super League club Catalans Dragons.

A teenage NRL debutant in 2007 with the Sydney Roosters and a premiership winner in 2013, Pearce played 238 games at the club before he was squeezed out by Cooper Cronk’s arrival at the end of 2017.

He took his NRL...