The Bay of Plenty Lakers' quest to defend their NZRL Championship title starts at Puketawhero Park today.The first step is to win the right to represent the Northern zone in this year's championship, starting with the first round of Northern qualifiers against Northland at 2.30pm.
Arguably the standout forward in last year's competition, Jeremy Siulepa, has hung up his representative boots this season and will instead take up the role of Lakers head coach. He has named a strong side comprising a mixture of experience and youth.
"I'm passionate about coaching, I've coached before in the younger grades, and this is a new challenge.
"The skill level of this team is exciting, we've got a couple of older guys who have done it before and some young ones coming through as well. I think the main focus for this team was to give everybody an opportunity to play and to try to start a culture and environment where everyone wants to play for the Bay and has pride in the jersey."
He said the "brotherhood" among the players in last year's Lakers squad played a major role in how well they went and was something he wanted to build on. One of the men leading that aspect would be returning captain Johnson Peri, who had another dominant season for Mangakino in the Bay of Plenty/Coastline Premier competition this year.