WIGAN WARRIORS fullback Grace Banks believes the added pressure on her team this year will prove to be a good thing as they prepare to defend three titles.
Having swept the board last year by landing the Challenge Cup, League Leaders’ Shield and Grand Final, she knows every other team in the league will be keen to get one over on the Warriors, who host Cardiff Demons in the Cup quarter-finals on Saturday.
But Banks is also looking forward to the challenge this will bring.
“Last season was so surreal,” she tells the new issue of RL World magazine.
“Hopefully the excitement of winning it all last year continues into this. But it is going to be a different challenge for us, and I think that added pressure is something we need as a team.
“There was no pressure on us last year because we hadn’t won any trophies in a long time, and we just thought, ‘let’s just play as well as we can and see if we can win it’.
“But this year, we might need to learn how to play under that pressure of things being expected of us, and other teams wanting to stop us.
“That is something we’ve already spoken about in training, and we know that the only way we can get used to that and learn how to manage it is by playing in those games where we are under a lot of pressure.
“With the way the season is this year, and the split, we will get more like that, and the more competitive games we get will hopefully push us a bit further and harder every week.”
To read the full interview with Banks, see issue 520 of Rugby League World – out this Friday at totalrl.com/shop.