Dyldam Parramatta Eels co-captain Tim Mannah says he’s glad to be back on the field, after the Eels’ 60-14 win over the Wests Tigers in their first trial match for 2014.
The 23-man Eels squad showed promising signs for the season ahead, and Tim says it was a relief to blow out the cobwebs.
“It’s this time of year that everyone gets itchy feet - they enjoy the pre-season but come February you just want to play football again,” he said.
“We’re really happy with the result, not so much the scoreline but that everyone did their job well.”
“So it was nice to get a taste of it again, and we’re looking forward to more over the next couple of weeks.”
Tim says he’s most impressed with the way young players, such as Pauli Pauli, Toby Evans and Zach Dockar-Clay stepped up to the plate in their NRL debuts.
“The trials are a great chance to give the young ones a chance of playing footy, and they do so well in the preseason so sometimes you want to see them play under a bit of pressure,” he said.
“I thought they handled it very well, a lot of the young guys really stood up today, and as a senior player it makes us very proud, and I think the coaching staff would be proud as well.”
After a successful first week in Alice Springs, Tim says they’ve achieved everything they want out of our partnership to bring rugby league to the NT.
“We wanted to get in there not just to play footy, but go to schools and the community and [spread] the anti-bullying message campaign,” he said.
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