Star Super League signings set for debuts this weekend

Huddersfield Giants Head Coach Ian Watson has named his 26-Man Squad for Sunday’s final friendly vs Betfred League 1 side Dewsbury Rams.

With the opening round for the Giants just two weeks away, Ian Watson has selected his strongest side of 2023 yet, as he looks to give valuable minutes to his senior members of his squad who didn’t play at Castleford Tigers last Sunday.

Nathan Peats, Kevin Naiqama and Esan Marsters are all included after signing in the off-season.

For Naiqama and Marsters it is a chance for them to debut and for Peats its his second debut at the club after a loan spell with the Giants in 2021.

Here is the squad named by Watson for Sunday:

ADAM O’BRIEN – PMW Quarries
ASHTON GOLDING – Mathewson & Rosemond
CHRIS MCQUEEN – David Burdsey
CHRIS HILL – Pa-Pi Pasta & Pinsa
ESAN MARSTERS – MB Electrical Contractors
HARVEY LIVETT – Smile Bar & Venue
HARRY RUSHTON – MF Rendering
INNES SENIOR – Grappolo Restaurant
JACK BIBBY – Peter Shelton
JAKE BIBBY – Alcedo Care
JERMAINE MCGILLVARY – MF Rendering
JOE GREENWOOD – Steve, Denise & Steph Carter
JOSH JONES – BCL Consultancy Ltd
KEVIN NAIQAMA – Matsuura Machinery
KIERAN RUSH – Matsuura Machinery
LEROY CUDJOE – The Legends Club
LUKE YATES – Matsuura Machinery
MATTY ENGLISH – Paul Tunnacliffe & Helen Whiteley
NATHAN PEATS – Dom Karimi
OLLY WILSON – Team Roche
OWEN TROUT – Chris & Tracy Taylor
SAM HEWITT – Richard & Lisa Jackson
SEB IKAHIHIFO – David Burdsey
THEO FAGES – Signature Resin Floors
TUI LOLOHEA – Martin Thornton Estate Agents
WILL PRYCE – The FM Company

This came after Ian Watson confirmed at yesterday’s launch he would be naming as strong as a line up as he can.

He also spoke about pre-season more widely.

He said: “I think pre-season has had to be different, even right now as we speak we’re still in pre-season. We’ve got Dewsbury this week. But the training loads have still been pre-season loads so normally at this time they would have started coming down.

“The game against Castleford last week we’d run ridiculous loads the week before it, we’d not dropped it for them games. The games are kind of irrelevant at the moment, they’re just part and parcel of a tough pre-season because what we need to be is ready for Warrington in round two, because we’re not playing round one. So we’ve got an extra week which probably in some ways is good for us because we’ve only had some of the World Cup guys back for three or four weeks now.

“The pre-season I’d say has been good for us in some ways, we managed to get the week away, we looked really good and really sharp there and now we’re starting to get towards the games but the workload has been incredibly high of late. We need to bring that down after this weekend and start to get ready for Warrington.”