
One Championship rugby league boss has spoken on their disrupted pre-season that has been hampered by player exits and an inability to train.
The current cold freeze is affecting the majority of teams in the rugby league heartlands with several pre-season friendlies and Challenge Cup ties cancelled this weekend and Sheffield Eagles are no different.
They have seen Quentin Laulu-Togaga’e’s testimonial match cancelled on account of the weather in what has been an incredibly disrupted off-season for them.
The Eagles saw former head coach Mark Aston banned from coaching leading to the appointment of ex-Castleford Tigers boss Craig Lingard in early January. He has since seen one of the club’s assistant coaches depart as well as one of the club’s star forwards.
Lingard has now spoken on the club’s YouTube channel about the disrupted pre-season, revealing that his side have not completed a field session since December 23rd – almost three weeks ago. He also addressed the exit of New Zealand-born forward Bayley Liu with the second-row joining Championship rivals Bradford Bulls.
Rugby League coach bemoans disrupted pre-season at new club

Credit: Olly Hassell/SWpix.com
With the cold freeze claiming several games, it’s also impacting training – something that Lingard highlighted would be affecting almost every rugby league club in the country, or at least those part-time sides.
He said: “We can’t control the weather can we? Every other team will be exactly the same as we are unless they’ve got an indoor facility where they can train but there are not many part-time teams who have got that.
“I would imagine that pretty much every other team in rugby league is contending with that. It’s not ideal because we were late starting pre-season. Our last session as a group was the 23rd of December and coming back, we’ve not got on the field as yet.”
Revealing how the club had used their time instead, he explained: “We’ve done some gym sessions, and some meetings and tried to utilise that time in a positive way. We’ve tried to put some plans and standards in place that we want to aim for – it’s about utilising the time as best as we can.”
Lingard only took charge of Sheffield six weeks ago and the club’s first competitive game will be in the Challenge Cup in a fortnight’s time. As such, Lingard noted the fact the club will be fixing issues on the fly.
He also spoke on the loss of Liu, who has signed with Bradford Bulls, something Lingard labelled as ‘not ideal’ but something he accepted.
Lingard said: “In terms of Bayley, again, it’s not ideal but one of the first things I said to the players in my first meeting here was that I understood players had signed under a different regime and under a different coach.
“If people didn’t want to be at the club for whatever reason then I’d shake their hands and they could walk away. I had a chat with Bayley and he’d been having a think about it for a while that he wanted a new challenge. There’s no fall-out there.
“As far as I’m concerned, I only want people at Sheffield who want to play for Sheffield. We’ve got to have people who are 100% in for Sheffield. If a player comes to me, it doesn’t matter who it is, that doesn’t want to be at the club then we’ll do what we can to move that player on.”
Sheffield Eagles have signed a host of players for 2025 including former Super League players Corey Johnson, Morgan Smith and Reiss Butterworth.
