Refreshed Kirmond moving on from Wildcats’ dogfights

Correspondent

Wakefield back rower Danny Kirmond insists that there is a fine spirit in the Wildcats’ camp ahead of the new season following the problems of 2015.

Tim Smith and Kevin Locke were sacked from the club late last year because of off-field behaviour and recently a video emerged of the two former players involved in a car accident. Despite this, Kirmond maintains that there is fresh focus at Belle Vue for the coming campaign.

“The video coming out has not really been mentioned,” he told Love Rugby League.

“Obviously, there was a bit of talk when it came out, because we’d not seen it, same as everyone else.

“But everyone knew what had happened, and we dealt with that at the time, and moved along from it pretty quickly, which we had to do, because it happened at a really important time of the season for us.

“It was a close time, when we had to achieve our goal of staying in Super League.

“So we had to move on from it quickly, and this year’s a new year.

“There’s new people here, and a new vision for the club, and new goals as well.

“So not much was said about it, and not much notice taken of it either.”

Trinity faced a testing season in 2015, and had to fight hard to stave off the threat of relegation in the Qualifiers section of the Middle 8s.

Kirmond hopes that they can aspire to higher things in 2016.

“As a player and fan of a club, you don’t want to be fighting not to be bottom,” he said.

“That’s the goal now, we want to improve and be better than we were last year.

“The people we’ve signed will enable us to do that, if everyone rips in.

“The way everyone’s come back into pre-season from their time off and their time away shows the ambition of the players too.

“We all want to do better than last year, we don’t want to be in the same kind of dogfight as last year.”

Kirmond himself was also sidelined by a shoulder injury for much of last season, but he is now back to full fitness, and relishing the chance to rip in once again.

“The back end of last season was frustrating with my shoulder,” he said.

“But I got those last two games in and then got time to recover in the off-season.

“I had a couple of nice holidays, and just unwound a little bit, after what had been a tough season.

“So I came back really refreshed, and I’m looking forward to a new challenge, which it is this year.

“The club’s changed a lot in the off-season, there’s a lot of new players, and a high calibre of players too.

“The excitement this year is something I’ve not felt for the game as a whole for a long time.

“It’s refreshing to come in with that attitude, and to come into a club that you know is moving forward.”