Luke Gale - It's exciting times for Leeds Rhinos, Super League...and me

It is exciting times for me; Leeds Rhinos and Super League and pre-season could not have gone any better.

The boys have been great, it has been tough but, for me personally, it has been great to do a pre-season.

I have missed a few with international duties and the last 18 months being injured as well, but now I feel fit and as good as could be.

It is good to be back and, on Sunday against Hull, I’ll get to do something I’ve always wanted – walk out at Headingley as a Leeds player in a Super League game.

There’s no better occasion to make my full debut for Leeds, in front of a packed Emerald Headingley.

I think the double-header – with Cas and Toronto – is a great initiative by Super League to get the game in a bit more of the spotlight.

I was at the Super League launch last week and it’s the most eagerly-awaited competition I’ve been part of – and I have been around a fair few years.

The stars in the room make it a really exciting league to be part of. Sonny Bill, George Burgess, James Maloney – they are all going to light up the competition and there’s so many stars this year, I have no doubt it is going to be the biggest and best yet.

Headingley was a fantastic place to hold the launch. It is a first-class facility and a first-class club and we need to put in first-class performances on the field. That is how the club will be judged and everything else here is grade one.

Saints will be the team to beat this year, there’s no doubt about that. They have been the best team by a country mile the last two seasons.

They won it last year and they didn’t quite get it done in 2018, but they were the best team then as well.

They are the only team not to make any changes so that shows how good a squad they’ve got.

They are the ones to catch but, if we can go over there and be competitive, that’s what we want to do, be competitive and win the big games. I think that’s how we’ll be judged this year.

Coming to Leeds was an opportunity I could not turn down.

It’s my boyhood club and I am positive, with Rich Agar and the coaching staff he’s got – and the players we’ve got – we will definitely be a lot further forward than last year.

We need to be. They didn’t start great last year but, as an outsider looking in, you could see when Rich came in there was a mental switch.

They worked hard for each other and we want to build on that because it’s a big year for the club.

Wearing the number-seven shirt will be special for me and it’s extra-poignant with what is happening with Rob Burrow.

Rob has been the seven at this club through my generation and what a fantastic job he has done. The toughness and resilience of him, he gave his heart and soul every week.

If I could replicate that, I’d be a proud man. It was so sad when the news of his motor neurone disease came out.

I played against him for a lot of years so it was a bit different for me. I looked up to him as an opponent, but a lot of the boys have been team-mates of his.

The Bradford game was an emotional day. I am a father myself and that rams home what he is going through and what his family are having to deal with as well.

There’s a lot of added emotion.

You have got to bottle that emotion, but we will definitely be doing it for Rob and, if we can show the same sort of spirit he had in his playing days and is showing now, we will be doing a good job.