New Leigh Leopards recruit suffers season-ending blow as Adrian Lam provides full injury update

Ben Olawumi
Adrian Lam

Leigh Leopards head coach Adrian Lam

New Leigh Leopards recruit Will Brough has dislocated his shoulder and will likely miss the entirety of the 2025 campaign, head coach Adrian Lam has confirmed.

18-year-old Brough joined Leigh from fellow Super League outfit Wakefield during the off-season following a 2024 season which saw him form part of the treble-winning Trinity squad in the second tier.

The son of 2013 Man of Steel Danny, teenager Will – who was handed the #31 shirt – made his unofficial Leopards bow in last weekend’s friendly away against Warrington Wolves.

During that game, which doubled up as Toby King’s testimonial, the youngster was forced off – and boss Lam has now confirmed that the blow is a serious one.

New Leigh Leopards recruit Will Brough suffers season-ending blow

Brough only penned a one-year deal at the Leopards’ Den for 2025, but at least doesn’t appear to have anything to worry about on that front.

Speaking to LoveRugbyLeague at Wednesday’s Super League launch in Manchester, Lam detailed: “Will Brough’s dislocated his shoulder, so he’s going to probably miss the full season.

“We’ve got to get some scans done on that, but it doesn’t look good at the moment.

“Already in what we’ve seen, we’ve liked, so we’ve talked to him about signing a longer-term (contract) there.

“It’s really sad that he’s got such a serious injury so early in his career with Leigh/

“There were some things that we’d seen in the off-season that we really like about him.

“We’ve got to support him now get right behind him and make sure we’re there to get him through this difficult period after the operation, whenever that may be.

“Then, we’ll make sure he develops as part of our programme.”

Adrian Lam provides full Leigh injury update ahead of cup clash

Leigh head to League 1 outfit Workington Town on Friday night in their first competitive game of the year.

Lam has named his squad for the Challenge Cup Third Round clash, and it’s essentially as it was barring the injury to Brough.

A quintet of players all remain absent, and Lam admits there’s a chance they could yet miss the Leopards’ trip to Wigan Warriors on February 13 as the new Super League campaign gets underway.

The Papua New Guinean chief said: “Edwin (Ipape)’s a 50/50 for Round 1, there’s a handful of them that are in the same boat.

“Josh Charnley’s out for this Challenge Cup match, Darnell McIntosh, Edwin, Robbie Mulhern and Ben Nakubuwai.

“Those five players aren’t in consideration for this game, but are all working hard towards Round 1.”