'We'll do what we have to do' - Leeds Rhinos star's vow over Super League schedule

Betfred Super League’s schedule for the 2021 season is due to be announced in January.

It is a World Cup year, with the global tournament kicking off in October, so midweek matches will be needed to fit a 27-round league campaign, plus play-offs and the Coral Challenge Cup, into a shorter-than-normal timespan.

That will be nothing new after the coronavirus-hit 2020 season that ended seven weeks later than originally planned.

Leeds played 19 games between August 2 and November 13 this year, including six in 20 days at one stage, and that took its toll.

Another fixture pile-up will add more pressure on to players, but Mellor insisted: “We’ll just get on with it.”

The former Huddersfield Giants second-rower said: “Whatever’s put in front of us, we just have to deal with.

“As rugby players you don’t have much say in it, you just roll with it and get on with it.

“If you want to complain about it, you do it after - when you’ve already done it.”

But he conceded spells of one game per week will be welcome, when they come.

“I am looking forward to playing, recovering, training and having a full week until you play again,” he added.

“That would be nice if we get that but, if that’s not the case, then that’s not the case.

“We will just do what we have to do.”

Looking back on the closing two months of last season, Mellor admitted it was challenging, physically and mentally.

“I think I only did it once when I played and then three days later I played again,” he said.

“But as a back-rower you tend to play a lot of minutes, at quite a high intensity.

“At the start of the game, after about two minutes, I felt like I had played the full 80 the day before.

“There were some lads who played four games in 10 days and I don’t know how they walked off afterwards.

“To do two in four days was tough enough and they did four in 10, but none of them complained - they just got on with it.

“All you do is play-recover, play-recover.

“I would like to not see that again, but if it happens, it happens.”

Rhinos have been on their off-season break since the play-offs loss to Catalans Dragons last month.

They will report back to begin pre-season training on Monday, with Betfred Super League set to kick-off 66 days later on March 11.

Normally, pre-season starts in November and players have Christmas off before a final push to the beginning of the campaign at the end of January or early February.

The late finish to the 2020 season, because of coronavirus, has altered the time frame and Mellor reckons that that is a positive.

“I think it’s good,” he said of the nine and a half weeks’ preparation.

“Usually, you are in pre-season and all you are looking forward to is Christmas. That is the light at the end of the tunnel and you are looking forward to a break.

“Now, when you train it is going to be all momentum because we are looking forward to getting straight into playing.

“The two months we are going to have are going to be so game-focused, ready to start, not ready for a break and then coming back again.

“It will be good to get some momentum and start the season rolling.”

It will be Mellor’s second pre-season with Leeds, following his move and he is hoping for a more straightforward year in 2021.

“It was a strange season really, with all the Covid stuff and then winning the Challenge Cup, which creates such a high - and then finishing on a ban, which was strange for me,” Mellor recalled.

“I was watching the lads and not being able to do anything, then the season finished and we weren’t able to celebrate properly. It was a really weird season and I was glad to see the back of it.

“It has been nice having a bit of time at home and training is going all right at the minute - we are doing a bit of training on our own, keeping ourselves fit.

“We’ve been doing a bit of running, a bit of weights and we will be ready to rip in on January 4.”

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