Catch up with Amy Wesson

Castleford Tigers are raring to start the 2021 Betfred Super League campaign on Sunday as it brings a close to a long twelve-week pre-season. Amy Wesson discusses how preparation for the new season has been and shares just some of the hard work done by both the staff and the players.

“It’s been a really great pre-season with different challenges on the way with all the various weather we have had and not being able to get on the pitches we would have liked, but as a rule, it has been really good. Everyone has been on it; their attitudes have been great!”

The 2021 pre-season has been unique with many COVID-19 protocols in place around The Mend-A-Hose Jungle, but every person working within the squad has dealt with these challenges and knuckled down to get ready for match action, as Amy details.

“Ahead of pre-season we had an inspection with recommendations to further improve our environment regarding COVID, all the boys are on it with the rules, filling their wellness forms every morning, staff and players wearing their PPE they need to.

“Nick (Raynor), our doctor has been really on it with guidelines and anything at all we needed, no matter what time of day it is, he is always on hand to speak to. It’s been such a big team effort with us all and we are all doing our best.”

In further efforts to keep the Tigers players on the field of play for longer this season, more work has been undertaken by both our coaches and staff.

“We always have put a big emphasis on both prehab and something we call pre-part too, we take measurements of the players every day that we then compare to their previous measurements and if there are any changes, we have a look into why, and that is done every day.

“Prehab is when we go through specific stretches and activation work before going into the warmup with our Strength & Conditioning coaches. This year I have also led on Pilates sessions with the players too, a core session at least once or twice a week. Furthermore, we always monitor the GPS data to look at the load on our players.

“Things like concussions, fractures, some of those are sadly unavoidable, but we work as hard as we can on things that we can control. In terms of getting the players ready to go on the field, getting them up to speed, it’s all to hopefully avoid any issues.”

Amy’s first matchday with the First Team in 2020 was the opening round double header at Headingley with a sold-out crowd of supporters in attendance. Fast forward to the start of the 2021 season and it will be a quieter affair in the ground due to matches being played initially behind closed doors.

“You always look forward to games in every pre-season, they are long weeks to get the players ready so naturally everyone gets excited for games to be back anyway. But having crowds back soon will be a big boost for all the boys who are used to playing in front of crowds. Having empty stadiums has been weird but as it happened more and more, we got more used to it really, but we all can’t wait to have crowds back!”