Liam Watts takes on surprising squad number in nostalgic twist

Liam Watts has moved from the number eight shirt at Castleford Tigers way up the list to the number 32 shirt in a nostalgic move with Watts taking on the shirt number he first wore when he first joined the club.

This comes after Lee Radford spoke about the challenge for Watts to change his game for the modern sport:

“It’s a challenge for Liam because players of that age have been taught t put as much pressure as they can on a halfback so it’s a game of cat and mouse because they want time on the ball and we want to take it away from them.

“Sometimes when you are working hard to put pressure on from the inside, you have a fraction of a second to make a decision.

“They were really harsh on that last year so this year we can prepare for it because last year because it got dropped on us in the friendlies last year.”

Meanwhile, Danny Richardson has moved from the number seven shirt at Castleford Tigers.

This is presumably so Jacob Miller and Gareth Widdop can take the number six and seven shirts in the new Super League season though this has not been confirmed.

What has been confirmed is that Richardson will wear the number 37 shirt in 2023, the highest shirt at the Jungle, as confirmed at the club’s event tonight at Oulton Hall.

That said, there is a chance that we don’t see Richardson at all in 2023 after he underwent surgery in 2023 and perhaps this is why he is so high up the squad numbers.

This comes as boss Lee Radford confirmed Richardson and Callum McLelland are still recovering.

He said on Tigers TV:

“Really disappointing, Callum signed him on the impression that he would be back last April. To lose another half for the season was disappointing, then it was all systems go for this year.

“We need a progression in him.

“It’s one of them, I don’t want to predict something and it doesn’t come off.

“With Danny Richardson being out for the season with his injury, we’re short in that position already.”