St George Illawarra Dragons recruit George Burgess will make his competitive return at the St George Illawarra Dragons on Sunday week.
It was thought his career may have been over after suffering a hip injury just eight games into the 2020 English Super League season with the Wigan Warriors.
He had spent the previous seasons with the South Sydney Rabbitohs before his return to England, but the hip injury saw him released from the club as he spent the remainder of the season, and all of 2021, rehabilitating the injury.
While he didn't play a game in 2021 - or during the second half of 2020 - Burgess signed a two-contract with the St George Illawarra Dragons on the ninth of August last year which would see him return to Australia and the NRL.
He has since been in training since his return and The Sydney Morning Herald are reporting that he is set to play 20 minutes in the Dragons first trial against the Parramatta Eels.
The Dragons will then play the South Sydney Rabbitohs the following week in the annual Charity Shield clash at the Glen Willow Sports Complex in Mudgee.
RELATED: Full NRL pre-season fixtures, broadcast details
The 29-year-old was part of a recruitment drive for the Dragons which has been widely criticised, bringing in Burgess, Aaron Woods, Francis Molo and Jack Gosiewski to bulk up the club's forward pack.
Club coach Anthony Griffin told the publication Burgess is enjoying a full pre-season.
“With George, every day is a new day,” Griffin said.
“He’s come back from major surgery, but he’s enjoying a full pre-season, and he hasn’t been able to have a full pre-season [in previous years] because of his hip problem.
“Our staff have done an amazing job with him. Apart from a couple of times where they’ve had to de-load him, since Christmas he’s been going flat out and is looking forward to playing.
“We might give him 20 minutes against Parramatta on Sunday week and then get him ready for Mudgee. He’s trained with a lot of intensity since Christmas, and he’s got through all the work and contact, skills and modified games.
“The only little problem he has is not the actual hip but the muscles and tendons around it, and having to fire them up again because they haven’t been used for so long. The hip joint is in good nick, it’s putting the loads through that part of his body and getting everything firing the way it needs to.”
If Burgess can return to his best, then the Dragons will have got a bargain buy at $120,000 per year, with the 150-game veteran also playing a part in South Sydney's 2014 drought-breaking premiership.
There is no guarantee Burgess will be in the Dragons Round 1 side however, with Blake Lawrie, Josh Kerr, Josh McGuire, Jack de Belin, Francis Molo, Jackson Ford, Daniel Alvaro and Poasa Faamausili competing with Burgess for spots in the middle third.
Following the Dragons trial matches, they will open their season with a Saturday twilight clash against the New Zealand Warriors.
LoL, if McGuire still gets a run this year it’s a sad indictment of the clowns running the team. He should have been punted at the end of 2021 with all the signings we made. The biggest grub in the NRL and suspended for at least 10 weeks last year. Great value for the club, said no one ever.
$120k for Burgess? Of all the part-payment deals Hook has brought in that sounds like the most value. From memory his worst attribute were his dropsy hands so if he keeps the mistakes to a minimum he should be a real asset.
That’s the report – I reckon it could be pretty decent value.