Sheens impressed with pre-season progress

A couple of the burning questions surround the team captaincy and who will be wearing the number one jersey in the NRL season-opener against Gold Coast Titans.

“The six weeks we did before Christmas were brilliant,” said Sheens.

“We’re going into a bit more contact now in getting ready for the trials.

“Our first trial, we’ll be giving a lot of our younger guys a go, a lot of our senior boys will still be preparing for the second trial.”

“But in saying that, it gives a lot of the guys that have been training with us pre-Christmas, an opportunity to play.”

When asked what has particularly impressed him leading into the 2023 season, Sheens not only expressed praise for the playing group, but his new team of coaching staff.

“The enthusiasm’s been great, not only from the players but my coaching staff too; that includes the new high-performance team under Peter Moussa,” added Sheens.

“Benji, Robbie, Dave Furner have been brilliant, as well as Wayne Lambkin, our Pathways Transition Coach.

“We’re well-organised, and we’re getting a lot of information down to our lower grades, so overall I’ve been really happy with how it’s all been operating.”

Sheens is remaining tight-lipped on some of the key decisions ahead, but when it comes to the fullback spot, he’s pleased with the options available.

“The trials will sort that,” he said.

“We’ve got Charlie (Staines) training on the wing and at fullback, Daine (Laurie) has been training at fullback and pivot, plus we’ve also got another young fullback Jahream Bula, who’s who’s been training really well.

It’ll be very interesting to see who grabs it.

Tim Sheens

The four-time premiership winning coach is up front about the team’s ambition in the season ahead, and that’s to play finals football.

For me it’s about setting a goal for the Top 8

Tim Sheens

“There’s no reason we can’t set that as a goal, but in saying that we need to work very hard to achieve that goal game-by-game, session-by-session.”