LEIGH LEOPARDS have turned up the heat as the countdown to the new season continues.
The Leopards are training in Lanzarote ahead of pre-season matches against Leeds and Warrington before the big opener at home to Salford in front of the Sky Sports cameras on Friday, February 17.
Having led Leigh to promotion from the Championship in their first season at the helm, coach Adrian Lam, his right-hand man Tony Clubb and head of rugby Chris Chester have reshaped the squad with the backing of owner Derek Beaumont.
While the quartet know it’s vital Leigh buck their trend of lasting just a year in the top flight – it happened in 2005, 2017 and again in 2021 – Chester insists a push for the top-six play-offs isn’t out of the question.
Four of last season’s top five try-scorers, Nene Macdonald (27), Krisnan Inu (25), Caleb Aekins and Blake Ferguson (both 21), have departed, but star Papua New Guinea hooker Edwin Ipape (23) is among a number of the squad still at the club.
Meanwhile Leigh have signed backs Tom Briscoe and Zak Hardaker (both from Leeds), Ricky Leutele (Huddersfield), Gareth O’Brien (Castleford) and Tom Nisbet (St Helens), Warrington forwards Matt Davis, Jacob Gannon, Oliver Holmes, Jack Hughes and Robbie Mulhern, Newcastle prop or backrower Nathan Wilde and St Helens hooker Aaron Smith.
Nisbet and Smith featured on loan last year, the latter figuring in all but two of 34 matches in all competitions.
Lam, whose squad includes his son Lachlan, the halfback who played alongside Ipape and Macdonald for the Kumuls at the World Cup, is working with his players at La Santa on the North-West coast of Lanzarote, one of the seven main Canary Islands.
Leigh will host Leeds on Saturday, January 21 (3pm) for the Bev Risman Trophy (the dual-code Great Britain international played for both) and they visit Warrington for Ben Currie’s testimonial on Saturday, February 4 (5.30pm).