‘His Christmas looks a little different’: Dragons flyer’s fight to retain no.1 jersey – Off-season Central

Dragons speedster Tyrell Sloan is leaving no stone unturned this off-season as he fights to keep his no.1 jersey.

Sloan is in a battle for the Dragons fullback spot with Zac Lomax, but due to a lengthy layoff through injury, the Red V’s new coach Shane Flanagan says the talented 21-year-old is putting in the hard yards over the Christmas break to make up for lost time.

Flanagan told foxsports.com.au back in July that he was planning a brutal training regime for Sloan during the off-season, but due to a syndesmosis injury and then a broken thumb, those plans were curtailed somewhat.

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However, now that Sloan is back on the training paddock, Flanagan is happy with the ground the fullback is making while other players enjoy their Christmas break.

“Sloany’s two or so weeks back into running, and the injuries were really disappointing because I had big plans for his November/December,” Flanagan told the SMH.

“But he’s put that behind him now and he won’t stop during the (Christmas) break, he’ll continue to train these two weeks because he’s had a lot of time off and every day’s crucial for him.

“He’ll do his own training and that’s just because he’s been out and hasn’t really been able to run or lift weights for a fair while with his arm in plaster.

“So his Christmas break looks a little bit different.

“He certainly hasn’t shied away from it, he was onboard with training through and he’s got a great attitude towards that extra work. All these players do.”

As that last comment suggests, Flanagan has been stoked with the attitude of all his players over the last couple of months.

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The new coach is clearly keen to make a huge impact from the outset, will need to get the best out of what he’s got on the roster at this stage, after a couple of Flanagan’s big free agency targets spurned the club to sign or re-sign with other teams.

This included star prop Addin Fonua-Blake signing with the Sharks from 2025 and gun playmaker Tom Dearden staying put in Townsville on a long-term deal with the Cowboys.

Flanagan isn’t deterred though, taking solace in the fact his current crop of Dragons have so far gone above and beyond to improve.

“They’ve trained really hard, I’ve been impressed with the effort, but we’ve started from a long way back too. There needed to be a lot of improvement,” Flanagan said.

“I think as a whole squad we were a bit underdone in a number of areas – fitness, strength, the ability to accelerate and decelerate, changing direction, and a lot of those things were down to me. That’s something we needed to work hard on and we have.

“They know that what they’ve dished up prior hasn’t been good enough, and they’re sick of it.

“From the captain Ben Hunt all the way down, they’re all sick of losing. So you’ve got to change, if you keep doing what you’ve done previously, you’ll get the same result.

“It hasn’t surprised me, that willingness to change, but it has pleased me. No one’s said, ‘this is too hard’ or questioned ‘why are we doing this?’”