Steamers welcome back happy skipper

The Bay of Plenty Steamers will get their season under way on Sunday. Captain Colin Bourke talks to Greg Taipari about his excitement as he returns from serious injury.
The memory of December 2, 2010, is bitter-sweet for Colin Bourke.
The 26-year-old is standing with his Barbarians teammates about to face world champions South Africa at Twickenham in front of a capacity crowd. Minutes later, after being cleaned out in a ruck and having ligaments ripped from his shoulder joint, his season is over.
Fast-forward some seven months and 15 days and the 1.92-metre-tall No8 will be standing alongside his Steamers teammates about to face Counties Manukau Steelers at Bayer Crowers Stadium in Pukekohe.
It may be a long way from the home of rugby but the situation is just as exciting for the captain.
"I'm bloody excited to get back out there. Obviously it's been seven months and I'm just itching to get back into the blue and gold and play some enjoyable footy," he said.
"I joined the boys in camp last week and I'm probably a week behind where I wanted to be at this time because I was a wee bit crook with food poisoning. But it's awesome to be back in that environment and to have our first game [tomorrow]."
Bourke said the past seven months had been frustrating having to recuperate and sit back and watch the Chiefs not live up to their potential.
"It was hugely disappointing with the injury first up and then thinking I was going to be back within a couple of games and then not being able to play for the Chiefs, but injuries are part of the game."
However, now back playing, Bourke said his shoulder was ready for the rough and tumble of top-level rugby.
"It's good - we had a pretty heavy day at training [earlier in the week] contact wise. Obviously playing against Manawatu last week was my third game back from injury. But it's feeling good."
Bourke hasn't entirely been out of the game - he dabbled in a bit of club rugby coaching.
"I just sort of helped the brother out with the Mount team, which was good just to sort of stay around and keep involved and not too far away from the boys. But it's still not the same as playing. I did get a bit frustrated.
"We've got a new bunch of guys (this year). I'm happy. We've got about 10 new guys and they've really bought into what we are trying to do this year," Bourke said.
"It [the season] is only eight weeks long. So there is no time for mucking around. We can't have that Bay of Plenty lull that we do either at the start or the end of a season. We've got to hit the track running because we're looking to get into that finals position."
The captain said he was expecting a tough encounter against the Steelers.
"Just thinking back to last year's game we just beat them in the last minute of the game. It was pretty scrappy. They are a huge looking team. They love that confrontational type of stuff.
"Up front for our boys we're just going to concentrate on our set pieces - our scrum and our lineout - because it seems to be when that goes well we play well."
Tomorrow's game kicks off at 4.35pm.
See Monday's Bay of Plenty Times for a full match report plus Genevieve Helliwell shares her story from the supporters' bus.