Canterbury Bulldogs visit Port Macquarie ahead of 2019 NRL season

Canterbury’s first grade squad dropped in to Port Macquarie on Tuesday afternoon for a three-day camp as a reward for their efforts during pre-season.

“I think it’s just good to get away from footy for a bit and clear our heads,” the skipper said.

“It’s been a long stint of pre-season so it breaks it up a bit because it can get repetitive and monotonous after a little while.

“Hopefully this getaway refreshes us and once we get back we can get back into some hard training.”

Jackson conceded the playing group were starting to get the itch to play again ahead of their first trial next month.

“We started back in early November so it’s been a pretty long stint, but we’re getting pretty close which is good.”

The recently turned 28-year-old admitted the Bulldogs started last season “tense” and attributed their change of fortunes halfway through the season to a more relaxed attitude.

He was hopeful that would enable them to hit the ground running in 2019.

“Once we relaxed throughout the back half of last year the results came for us and we played a bit more free-flowing football,” he said.

“We found out what worked for us which is that off the cuff, free-flowing, relaxed footy so we’ve been doing a lot of work on our attack throughout the preseason.”

The departures of David Klemmer, the Morris brothers and Greg Eastwood left a hole in their squad, but Jackson was confident their new signings were poised to fill the void.

Christian Crichton and Corey Harawira-Naera (both Penrith), Sauaso Sue (Wests Tigers) and Jack Cogger and Nick Meaney (both Newcastle) have all joined the kennel.

“All the guys that have come across have been fantastic and then we will have a few guys that come up from our under-20 system as well,” he said.

“They bring a different perspective from different clubs and a lot of energy.”

The NSW State of Origin representative said the injection of youth into their squad would help the Bulldogs continue their free-flowing, relaxed style of play that was successful at the back end of their 2018 campaign.

“The energy in pre-season has been really high which is what you get with a younger squad and everyone’s training really well,” he said.

The Bulldogs are especially strong in the back-row and Jackson said that would encourage competition for spots in their top 17.

“It’s a good thing for us because we’ve got a lot of depth and injuries happen throughout the year,” Jackson said.

“The guys that miss out on the 17 for the first round will have plenty of opportunities all year; we have a lot of depth which is exciting for the club.”

Canterbury start their NRL campaign on March 16 when they travel across the Tasman to face the New Zealand Warriors.

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