As much as I have been looking forward to the NRL starting this season 2024, the pre-season games have been a little underwhelming.
The players, particularly the younger ones getting their first run on the field in an NRL team in front of their mums and dads, wives, girlfriends, families and mates, it’s an exciting and proud moment for many.
But these games can also come with the high risk of injury and for others a stupid shoulder type charge or contact with the ball carrier’s head. At the least these actions get penalised and often the offending player is sent off.
Rugby League is a superfast high energy and contact sport, it is not a game of marbles and there are times when the contact looks sickening.
But the natural size of some of these young players – they are giants – combined with the strength and conditioning they undertake at club training can lead to a deadly missile on two legs.
Playing in the NRL requires many things that are physical, but maybe the most important of all is not a just a physical thing, it is concentration which allows the player during all the excitement and pressure to keep his head and always make the right play.
Trials have evolved over the last few decades and really these days only a few players break through to start up positions in the NRL. However, they do get the chance to showcase their talents.
Whether by personal choice or under instructions, from what I saw in the first round of the pre-season trials were too many young players were trying to demonstrate their physicality at the expense of their natural passing and evasive skills.
