Hull KR break silence on Jared Waerea-Hargreaves NRL chatter and confirm injury blow

Hull KR boss Willie Peters has responded to claims star prop Jared Waerea-Hargreaves should return to Sydney Roosters.

The former New Zealand international joined the Robins in pre-season on a one-year deal and is ever-present in the unbeaten Super League leaders’ five competitive games so far.

Veteran Aussie reporter Buzz Rothfield this week urged the Roosters to re-sign Waerea-Hargreaves in the wake of their 50-14 NRL round one drubbing by Brisbane Broncos and said people he talked to at the club ‘didn’t totally rule it out’.

However, speaking at his weekly preview press conference today (Tuesday), Peters insisted: “He is more than happy here. He will see his contract out for this year.”

Peters said: “I don’t think an approach has been made from the Roosters, from my understanding. I’ve had a conversation with Jared and he’s more than happy and I Iook forward to seeing him play throughout the year.”

Hull KR would like 36-year-old Jared Waerea-Hargreaves to remain on the books in 2026 and Peters revealed there have been ‘minimal chats’ with him about next season.

“That will be entirely up to Jared, he is going to make the call,” Peters added. “He has earned the right to decide whether he wants to go again or whether it’s time to retire. Either way, we’d support it.

“We’d love Jared around longer term, but if he decided that was his last year and he wanted to finish, then we’d have to support that.”

The coach reckons what Waerea-Hargreaves brings to the club off the field is as important as his influence on it. He stressed: “People can put numbers on carries and how many metres someone runs and all that sort of stuff, but you can’t put numbers on his culture and standards and intensity and I haven’t seen many better than Jared.

“What he gives us on the field we are happy with, but it is what he gives us off the field – he has certainly added to our culture and lifted our intensity and our standards.”

Meanwhile, Peters – whose side play host to Championship Oldham in the Challenge Cup fourth round on Friday – confirmed halves Tyrone May (hamstring) and Mikey Lewis (ankle) came through their return from injury unscathed in last weekend’s win at St Helens.

He said: “We are going to have a look at Mikey, he came back relatively early – he was only off a week so we’ll have to see how he goes this week. Tyrone has been good, he trained today.”

Forward Dean Hadley will miss the Cup tie after failing a head injury assessment during the Saints game, but full-back Niall Evalds is on track to make his comeback from concussion.

“Dean is good,” the coach reported. “He had a bit of dizziness and didn’t pass his head test. He will go through what he needs to this week and we’ll get him back the week after.

“Niall needs to get one more tick, he has got to see the specialist, but we are assuming everything will be okay there and he’ll be available this week for selection.”