Fiji Bati prop Daniel Saifiti is ready to lead his aggressive Newcastle Knights pack against the Cronulla Sharks in their opening pre-season Challenge Cup match tomorrow.
Speaking to Knights media today, Saifiti said he is ready to make a strong comeback in the team after a knee injury had blown him out of most NRL matches last season.
“Feeling good, fit, got a full preseason in, relatively injury free, a few niggles but nothing too bad. Back waist down and running real good.”
“Being consistent, I’ve had good patches in the past five to 10 games but I’ve put together a good season and now I’m going to stand off with things that’s really important, obviously being a fun road that leads the pack so I’ve just been having inconsistencies.”
“Just to get the cobwebs out. I’m thinking of playing for 20 to 30 minutes. The first one the lungs are always going to be burning but then my fit areas that don’t require much fitness are just more effort, defense and bringing the right attitude. That’s what I’ll be looking to do.”
“I feel like I’ve done it in the past for games but like I said not consistently over a year and now a good thing I’ve got someone exactly like me my brother up beside me so and it’ll be looking at tape be that too but it’s healthy competition.”
“This year we’ve got an aggressive pack and I definitely want to be at the front of it and take this team far.”
Saifiti said their aim this year is to improve and finish the competition on a high note while the newbies have gelled well in the team.
“Last year was disappointing and we left a sour taste in a lot of the boys’ mouths as it should obviously have a disappointing season like that.”
“We started training relatively early and came back real fast and hit the ground running. You don’t want to spend most of the preseason getting fit. Even though that is sort of the point if you want to be doing skills that early that’s what the good teams do. I felt like so far it’s worked out and put on a good display tomorrow.”
The Knights will face the Sharks at 6.55 pm tomorrow.
