Salford Red Devils were the surprise package in Super League last year and their preparations for replicating that amazing season in 2023 take a step forward this weekend as they take on Swinton Lions in a pre-season friendly.

Looking ahead to this game, star fullback Ryan Brierley said on the club’s Twitter: “We’re good, we’re obviously confident it’s been a long pre-season for some of the boys having the internationals come back after Christmas.

“It’s nice to be back in a game week, it’s been a tough couple of weeks.”

Brierley is keen for the Red Devils to keep up their momentum from 2022 in the new season:

“I think I said earlier about momentum, I think we’ve got some good momentum behind us. It’s important that we understand how we got that momentum in the first place, it was down to a lot of hard work especially defensively. We were a lot better in the second half of the season.

“I think there is a clear focus going into tomorrow’s game because last season we didn’t start the year great.”

As he prepares for the new season with the fixture against Swinton, Brierley opened up on the nerves he felt the last time he played them in his Salford debut:

“I don’t really get nervous for friendlies but for that one I did with it being my first game and with all the family watching. It was a special occasion for me, it was pretty special.”

Brierley has been dealing with an injury in pre-season. He believes this game will be key in assessing if he’s ready for the new season:

“We’ll soon find out tomorrow, it’s been good. I’ve done a lot of work over Christmas, I knew I needed to catch up. It’s feeling okay, I don’t think anyone will be 100% tomorrow but I’m feeling okay.”