WITH a team with an average age of 23, its hardly surprising City named a 24-year-old to lead out the team on Sunday.
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However Wade Graham doesn’t believe age will be too big a factor in the clash against Country.
Graham has only played the one game for City, in Coffs Harbour two years ago, before being given the task of leading the young City team against Country on Sunday.
He can’t wait to led the team onto the ground after a fun week in camp.
“It was a great honour when Freddie told me and we’ve got a fairly young squad,” Graham said.
“I’ve been lucky to be in the team previously with good leaders so I’m just trying to do what they taught me.”
City only have four players older than 24, with Joseph Paulo the oldest at 27, but Graham believes his experience with Cronulla will help him lead around the team.
“I’ve done the role at Cronulla for a few years now when Gal has been a way and nothing really changes that much,” he said.
“I just try to lead by example and have a few words here and there.
“It should be good.”
With such a young team there has been plenty of enthusiasm within the camp.
The majority have very little representative experience, but Graham believes its an opportunity to further their careers and get a welcome change from the intense lifestyle of an NRL player in Sydney.
“It’s always an exiting week to be a part of," he said.
"The NRL is such a week to week grind and any chance to be able to break away from that and get into a camp scene with players from each team is always fun.”
Even with plenty of new teammates for the week, club ties still hold strong with the Sharks City contingent of Graham and Andrew Fifita catching up with their temporary rival Jack Bird days before the game as both teams met the next generation of NRL hopefuls at the Trent Barrett Shield.
While Graham will lead City onto the field, he’s expecting Josh Reynolds to have a big hand in controlling the young team.
“Josh Reynolds is there and is a big leader of our teaming looking to put his best foot forward and get some good game time for NSW,” Graham said.
The game is an opportunity for Graham to relive some of his younger days after growing up with Matt Moylan and Nathan Peats.
Graham expects City will try and play a stylish game.
“We are just going to play footy and hopefully put on a good spectacle for the people of Wagga,” he said.
“Hopefully we can play the right type of footy and come away with the win.”
